THOMAS  NELSON  PAGE 


BY 


KARL  CONANT  BAUMGARDNER 


THESIS 


FOR  THE 


Degree  of 

BACHELOR  OF  ARTS 

IN  ENGLISH 


College  of  Liberal  Arts  and  Sciences 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 


1922 


\ 'L  % 

'frzzn, 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


I.  AMERICAN  LITERATURE  AFTER  TEE  CIVIL  WAR 

II.  TEE  ANCESTRY  AND  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  NELSON  PAGE 

III.  THE  OLD  SOUTH  AS  MR.  PAGE  PORTRAYS  IT 

IV.  "IN  OLE  VIRGINIA" 

V.  TEE  DECADE  1888-1897 

VI.  THE  NOVELS 

VII.  IN  THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY 

VIII.  BIBLIOGRAPHY 


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THOMAS  NELSON  PAGE 

I.  AMERICAN  LITERATURE  AFTER  THE  CIVIL  WAR. 

At  the  end  of  the  Civil  War  in  the  United  States,  the  whole 
South  lay  in  much  the  same  devastated  condition  in  which  northeastern 
Prance  was  to  be  found  after  the  Armistice  of  1918.  The  Confederate 
States  had  been  stripped  of  every  resource  in  order  that  the  cause  foD 
which  they  fought  might  be  victorious.  The  white  men  and  many  of 
their  negro  servants  had  left  their  homes  to  take  their  places  in 
Lee's  armies,  and  the  women  had  literally  sacrificed  everything  but 
their  honor  to  keep  the  men  fed  and  clothed.  Into  the  far  South, 
where  utter  ruin  was  long  forestalled,  Sherman's  troops  had  invaded, 
and  had  left  destruction  behind. 

The  states  lying  along  the  northern  border  of  the  South,  those 
over  which  most  of  the  battles  had  been  fought,  had  been  so  trampled 
and  gashed  by  the  conflict  that  the  fields  required  a vast  amount  of 
tilling  before  they  could  be  used  again  with  profit.  Farther  south 
the  land  had,  for  three  years  or  more,  lain  quite  untended,  and  weeds 
and  wild  grasses  were  growing  where  fruitful  plantations  had  been  the 
delight  of  their  owners  in  the  years  before  1861.  The  male  population 
had  been  so  drained  away  during  the  war,  for  the  young  negro  men  had. 
been  needed  to  drive  mules  and  to  work  at  all  sorts  of  odd  jobs,  if 
they  had  not  already  accompanied  their  masters  as  body-servants,  that 
there  was  no  one  left  to  do  the  farmwork  but  the  women  and  the  aged 
legroes.  In  the  latter  months  of  the  war.  Northern  raiders  had  been 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/thomasnelsonpageOObaum 


2 


far  more  successful  in  invading  the  South  than  previously,  and  these 
soldiers  had  stolen  or  destroyed  a great  deal  of  the  supplies  of  food 
and  grain  that  the  Southern  women  had  managed  to  scrape  together  and 
to  hoard.  Many  a Confederate  soldier  returned  to  his  home  to  find  it 
destitute  of  everything  but  the  very  meanest  provisions  and  to  dis- 
cover that  he  and  his  family  must  live  far  more  uncomfortably  and 
with  many  more  privations  than  had  the  most  unfortunate  slave  of  pre- 
Snancipation  days. 

While  the  Northern  states  had  suffered  in  no  such  tangible  ways 
as  had  those  below  the  Mason  and  Dixon  Line,  yet  upon  the  North  had 
devolved  the  task  of  providing  food  and  clothing  for  the  whole  coun- 
try until  the  South  could  again  do  its  share.  Sven  before  the  war 
had  continued  long,  the  North  had  begun  to  make  the  changes  in  her 
interests  and  in  her  industries  which  were  later  to  prove  of  such  vi- 
tal importance,  not  only  to  the  United  States,  but  also  to  the  whole 
world.  Machinery  had  to  be  invented  and  developed  to  take  the  place 
of  the  men  called  into  the  service.  Meat  had  to  be  packed.  Clothing 
in  large  quantities  had  to  be  produced.  "Big  business"  had  its  birth 

Thus  each  of  the  two  great  sections  of  the  United  States  was 
forced  to  examine  and  test  its  own  and  each  other's  strengths  and 
weaknesses.  The  result  of  this  mutual  inspection  was  a strong  and 
ever-increasing  interest  in  people  and  things  American.  Previous  to 
the  war,  Europe  had  been  the  model  for  the  United  States,  and  Ameri- 
cans, both  northern  and  southern,  had  followed  her  more  or  less 
blindly  in  their  undertakings.  'Then  the  war  was  over,  they  realized 
that  mental  and  physical  ability  was  not  possessed  solely  by  the 
2uropeans,  for,  in  moving  from  state  to  state,  the  soldiers  had  be- 
come acquainted  with  the  resources  of  their  country.  So,  at  the 


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first  opportunity,  the  men  and  worn en  of  the  United  States,  just  awak- 
ened to  a knowledge  of  themselves  and  of  their  surroundings,  eagerly 
sought  to  profit  by  their  new-found  learning. 

Before  the  Civil  War  American  literature  was  as  typical  a matter 
of  sectionalism  as  was  slavery  or  ship-building.  Its  production  was 
limited  largely  to  one  city,  Boston,  and  the  men  who  wrote  it  were 
almost  all  graduates  of  Hew  .England  colleges.  The  four  exceptions 
were  Poe,  who  attended  both  the  University  of  Virginia  and  West  Point 
Whittier,  who  educated  himself,  and  Margaret  Puller  and  Mrs.  Stowe, 
who  never  attended  college  because,  at  that  time,  only  men  were  ad- 
mitted to  such  institutions.  About  twenty-five  or  thirty  men,  in- 
cluding Motley,  Lowell,  Enerson,  Webster,  Ticknor,  Hawthorne,  Long- 
fellow, Holmes,  and  Thoreau,  made  up  the  total  number  of  prominent 
American  writers  of  the  period  before  1860.  These  men  eagerly  turned 
to  Europe  for  their  inspiration,  reading  great  numbers  of  books 
printed,  for  the  most  part,  in  England.  Culture  was  their  goal,  and 
many  of  them,  not  content  with  reading  of  the  world  beyond  the  seas, 
sailed  over  for  a year  or  two  of  travel  and  study  in  foreign  countries 
quite  unmindful  of  their  own  land.  The  comparatively  small  amount  of 
prose  written  during  this  early  period  is  largely  made  up  of  travel 
sketches.  Bryant's  L ett ers  of  a Traveller . Greeley's  Glanc es  at 
Sur op e.  Mrs.  Stowe's  Sunny  Memori es  of  Foreign  Lands . and  Hawthorne's 
Our  Old  Home  are  typical  books  of  this  sort. 

Because  their  field  was  limited  to  New  Eigland  and  to  Europe, 
which  had  already  been  written  about  and  discussed  for  several  hun- 
dred years,  it  would  seem  that  these  writers  of  the  half-century  be- 

1.  Prom  a quotation  from  Bnerson,  given  in  Pattee,  P.  L, , American 
Literature  Sine  e 1870 , 8,  (The  Century  Company,  New  York,  1921 ) . 


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fore  1860  were  forced  to  look  within  themselves  for  inspiration  and 
fresh  subject-matter.  The  fact  that  the  age  was  one  of  sentiment, 
which  so  easily  submits  to  expression  through  the  medium  of  poetry, 
would  bear  out  this  supoosition.  When  one  reflects  how  greatly  Long- 
fellow dominated  this  period  and  how  easily  such  a ooet  as  Holmes 
wrote  charming  little  verses,  the  chief  characteristic  of  the  time  is 
apparent.  -Sven  the  prose  which  was  written  during  these  years  was 
highly  decorated  with  florid,  ooetical  figures.  A glance  at  the 
pages  of  any  of  Lowell's  essays  will  show  what  an  imoortant  place 
poetry  held  in  the  literature  of  America  before  the  Civil  War. 

With  the  end  of  the  fighting  and  the  beginnings  of  re-adjust- 
ment, American  writers  discovered  that  there  were  regions  in  the  U- 
nited  States  which  could  furnish  just  as  interesting  material  for 
literary  purposes,  as  could  Furope;  in  fact,  much  more  interesting, 
because  the  people  living  in  these  sections  and  the  atmosphere  in 
which  these  peoples  dwelt  v/ere  so  different  from  anything  Fhrope  had 
ever  produced.  Just  before  the  Civil  War,  the  Par  West  had  suddenly 
sent  out  its  invitation  to  the  gold-diggers,  and  the  Pocky  Mountains 
and  the  coastal  plains  beyond  had  quickly  become  inhabited  with  a 
race  of  men,  adventurers  out  of  the  iifest,  v/ho  were  speedily  molded 
by  privation,  by  climate,  and  by  association  with  each  other  until 
they  were  uniquely  Western,  homely,  rough,  and  dryly  humorous.  The 
plains  of  the  upper  Mississippi  were  training  another  race  of  men 
and  women,  a oeople  who  were  learning  to  adjust  themselves  to  the 
Indian  population,  just  as  their  fathers  and  grandfathers  had  learned 
several  decades  before  in  colonial  days.  At  New  Orleans  could  be 
found  the  descendants  of  the  French  settlers  v/ho  had  intermarried 
with  the  negroes  and  with  the  natives  of  the  French  West  Indies  and 


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of  Louisiana,  while,  all  over  the  South,  was  still  another  great  grou] 
of  people,  those  plantation-owners  who  haci  solved  rhe  problem  of  liv- 
ing as  the  masters  and  as  the  friends  of  the  slaves.  With  all  these 
interesting  people  to  know  and  to  study,  the  writers  of  America,  when 
their  attention  was  called  to  them,  were  at  no  loss  for  material,  and 
the  reading-public  was  soon  clamoring  for  more  and  more  information 
about  their  neighbors  and  fellow-citizens  in  the  out-of-the-way 
places.  The  actuality  of  war  dissipated  the  dreamy  haze  of  poetry 
that  had  been  drifting  across  the  pages  of  literature  for  so  many 
years,  and  instead  there  appeared  the  facts  of  the  lives  which  the 
people  of  the  various  sections  of  America  were  living,  and  these 
facts  tended  to  find  expression  in  the  plainness  and  virility  of 
prose.  Naturally  during  the  transition  period  from  the  ante-bellum 
literature  to  the  post-bellum,  there  was  still  a quantity  of  poetry, 
but  it  was  of  a very  informal  kind.  In  1867  appeared  Bret  Earte’s 
first  poems,  end  four  years  later  came  John  Hay's  Pike  County  Ballads 
which  indeed  were  an  innovation  in  American  verse,  or  in  the  verse 
of  any  other  country.  It  was  but  a step  from  such  poetry  to  prose; 
and,  dating  from  1869  with  Mark  Twain's  Innoc ents  Abroad,  which  ridi- 
culed the  former  tendency  to  encomiastic  books  on  foreign  travel,  be- 
gan the  age  of  realism,  with  prose  as  its  chief  mode  of  expression. 

This  realism,  which,  in  its  transition  stages,  had  many  charac- 
teristics of  the  previous  era,  was  due  in  a great  measure  to  the  in- 
fluence of  the  sentimentalist  Dickens.  Himself  a member  of  the  lower 
Ehglish  classes,  he  had  introduced  the  reading  public  of  lihgland  and 
of  America  to  new  types  of  characters,  the  men  and  women  and  children 
with  whom  he  had  lived,  and  whom  he  knew  the  best.  He  daringly  broke 
many  literary  conventions,  employing  vivid,  vigorous  characterization. 


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peculiar  dialect,  and  unceremonious  humor,  but  all  these  were  united 
by  warm  sentiment.  In  1870  Sickens  died,  and  there  immediately  swept 
over  America,  where  he  had  a greater  number  of  enthusiastic  admirers 
than  in  .England , a vast  wave  of  renewed  interest  in  his  fiction. 

Soon  there  appeared  novels,  such  as  those  of  Earte  and  .H^gleston, 
which  indicated  strongly  the  influence  exerted  by  Sickens  to  draw 
attention  to  the  grotesque  or  to  the  unfamiliar  in  the  commonplace. 

The  old  school  of  sentimentality,  which  refused  to  believe  that 
anything  ideal  could  be  found  in  the  barren  wastes  of  America,  for 
so  they  conceived  the  country,  did  not  gracefully  step  aside  in  favor 
of  the  new  school  of  realism,  which  insisted  that  the  modern  litera- 
ture should  picture  America  and  Americans  just  as  they  appeared  and 
in  just  as  peculiar  situations  and  in  as  strange  environment  as 
possible.  So,  for  two  or  more  decades  after  the  Civil  War,  there  was 
a compromise  between  the  old  and  the  new.  There  were  borderline  lo- 
calities, where  representatives  of  an  old  regime  had  not  yet  submit- 
ted to  a new.  When  the  gold-seekers  reached  California,  they  found 
there  the  remains  of  the  Spanish  Missions,  still  reminiscent  of 
Spain's  ancient  glory.  At  New  Orleans  and  higher  up  on  the  Missis- 
sippi, at  St.  Louis,  visitors  and  settlers  from  the  East  heard  tales 
of  the  days  and  nights  of  romance  when  France  still  owned  this  in- 
land emoire.  In  Virginia  and  on  the  plantations  of  the  South  were 
yet  the  memories  of  the  former  days  when  the  Cavaliers  of  the  Court 
of  Charles  I.  had  come  from  Puritan-inf es ted  Jhgland  to  leave  the 
soft,  but  lasting,  impress  of  their  gentle  manners  upon  their  de- 
scendants. 

Tradition  in  each  of  these  localities  was  responsible  for  an 
atmosphere  of  romance,  which  was  quite  alien  to  the  training  and 


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customs  of  the  North,  with  its  cold,  intellectual  beliefs.  No  one 
could,  however,  write  understandingly  or  convincingly  of  these  dif- 
ferent men  and  women  without  combining  romantic  atmosphere  and  real- 
istic detail.  Therefore,  because  of  these  borderline  localities, 
there  came  a border-line  literature,  which  developed  into  a new  ro- 
mantic-realistic movement,  and  the  inspiration  of  this  new  movement 
was  the  South.  George  W.  Cable  was  the  first  writer  of  this  school, 
with  his  stories  of  the  Creoles  of  N ew  Orleans.  He  was  followed  by 
General  hew  Wallace  and  Helen  Hunt  Jaemson,  who  dealt  with  the  Span- 
ish people  of  Mexico  and  of  California,  and  then,  somewhat  later, 
with  the  largest  and  most  significant  field  of  all  in  which  to  work, 
came  Thomas  Nelson  Page,  the  interpreter  of  Southern  aristocracy. 

"Borderline”  is  especially  applicable  to  Mr.  Page,  because  he 
lived  in  Virginia,  one  of  the  states  on  the  boundary  between  free  and 
slave  territory,  and  because  his  boyhood  home  lay  between  two  roads, 
almost  parallel,  of  which  one  was  in  the  possession  of  the  Federals 
and  the  other  in  the  control  of  the  Confederates  during  most  of  the 
war.  Living  thus  between  the  North  and  the  South,  knowing  the  lat- 
ter so  intimately  and  understand ing  the  former  so  well,  he  was  able 
to  handle  exoertly  Southern  themes,  so  that  the  Northerners  might 

come  to  know  and  to  appreciate  the  region  where  lately  there  had  been 

(1) 

hatred  and  war. 


1.  For  the  material  of  which  this  chapter  is  composed,  the  writer 
has  drawn  extensively  from  Chapters  I.  and  XII.  of  A History 
of  American  Literature  Since  1870 . Fred  Lewis  Pat tee,  (The 
Century  Company,  New  fork,  1921)'. 


- 


II.  THE  ANCESTRY  AND  IIFE  OF  THOMAS  NELSON  PAGE. 

Since  pride  of  family  and  an  aristocracy  developed  by  a long 
Succession  of  years  spent  in  public  service  were  such  important  fac- 
tors in  the  lives  of  the  Southern  plantation  owners  before  the  Civil 
War,  it  will  be  impossible  to  understand  the  most  powerful  of  all  the 
influences  upon  the  life  and  writings  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page  until  his 
immediate  ancestry  is  outlined.  This  is  especially  necessary  because 
from  the  earliest  days  of  colonial  Virginia  until  long  after  that 
commonwealth  had  become  one  of  the  United  States,  the  two  families 
of  the  Pages  and  the  Nelsons  were  intimately  and  prominently  connect- 
ed with  its  growth  and  prosperity,  although  they  themselves  willing- 
ly sacrificed  their  fortunes  in  its  behalf. 

Rosewell,  the  mansion  of  the  Pages,  was  built  on  a vast  planta- 
tion on  the  York  river,  which  included  the  kingdom  of  Powhatan;  and 
at  a little  place  named  Shelly, 

"once  a part  of  the  Rosewell  estate, 

• • • the  most  romantic  incident  of  Virginia’s  history  occurred,  wher 
the  little  tender-hearted  Indian  maiden,  touched  with  pity  for  an 
intrepid  young  captive,  prayed  in  vain  for  his  life,  and  then  flung 
herself  beneath  the  executioner’s  axe  and  clasoed  the  victim  in  her 
arms,  risking  her  own  life,  but  saving  John  Smith  and  the  colony  of 
Virginia. "J1 

The  founder  of  the  American  branch  of  the  Page  family 
was  a "Collonel  John  Page",  who  came  in  1656  from  Bed.font,  Middle- 
sex, Ehgland, 


"where  the  Pages  had  for  generations  been  lords  of  the 
small  manor  of  Page,  and  where^they  lie  buried  in  the  chancel  of  the 
quaint  little  Norman  church." 


In  Virginia,  the  "Collonel"  acquired 

1.  Page, Thomas  Nelson, "Two  Old  Colonial  Places", The  Ula  South , Plan- 
tation Edition, XII,  253. 

2.  Ibid. , 259. 


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a great  estate  on  the  York,  which  he  left  to  his  son  Matthew,  who, 
in  1690,  obtained  also  the  adjoining  estate  of  Timber  Heck,  when  he 
married  its  heiress,  Mary  Mann.  It  was  Mann  Page,  the  son  of  Matthew 
and  Mary,  who  built  Rosewell  in  1725-30.  After  Mann's  death,  which 
tradition  says  was  coincident  with  the  completion  of  the  Rosewell 
mansion,  the  estate  was  divided  between  his  three  sons,  Mann , who 
inherited  Rosewell,  John,  who  became  owner  of  North  Aid,  and  Robert, 
who  went  to  live  at  3roadneek. 

With  John  Page,  the  son  of  this  second  Mann,  the  two  families 
of  the  Pages  and  Nelsons  were  united  for  the  first  time,  when  John 
married  Frances  Burwell,  whose  mother  was  a Nelson.  John  was  a very 
ardent  patriot,  and  entered  into  Colonial  politics  much  more  tho- 
roughly than  had  his  father  and  grandfather,  who  had  been  content  wit! 
their  service  on  the  "Council  Board". 

"When  quite  a young  man  he  be- 
came a member  of  the  King's  Council  and  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of 
the  College,  and  represented  that  institution  in  the  General  Assem- 
bly. When  the  storm  came.  Page,  although  the  youngest  member  of  the 
King's  Council  was  the  head  of  the  Republican  element  in  the  Council. 
He  represented  Gloucester  in  the  Great  Convention,  was  elected  pre- 
sident of  the  Privy  Council,  and  was  a member  of  the  Committee  of 
Safety  that  had  control  of  the  Virginia  forces.  He  served  as  a 
colonel  in  the  army.  He  was  also  a member  of  the  first  Congress,  and 
continued  a representative  from  Virginia  for  eight  years,  ua±il,  as 
he  said,  'John  Adams  and  Alexander  Hamilton  shut  him  out'."  "He 
succeeded  James  Monroe  as  governor  of  Virginia  in  1602.  This  office 
he  held  for  three  successive  terms, --the  longest  period  allowed  by 
the  C onstitution , --and  was  thereafter  appointed  by  Mr.  Jefferson 
Commissioner  of  loans  for  Virginia,  which  office  he  held  at  the  time 
of  his  death,  on  the  11th  of  October,  1808."' ^ 

1.  "Two  Old  Colonial  Places",  The  Old  South,  XII,  263.  (Unless 

otherwise  noted,  citations  from  Mr.  Page's  works  are  taken  from 
The  Plantation  Adit ion , Chas.  Scribner's  Sons,  N ew  York, 
1906-1912) . 


2 


Ibid. ,877 


. 

. 


10 


A short  distance  from  Rosewell , across  the  river,  is  old  York- 
town,  which,  as  the  scene  of  Cornwallis's  surrender  to  Washington, 
is  so  intimately  connected  with  the  last  days  of  Virginia's  colonial 
history.  This  town  was  founded  by  Thomas  Kelson,  who  came  to  Vir- 
ginia very  early  in  the  eighteenth  century  from  the  little  Cumberland 
town  of  Penrith,  on  the  Scottish  border.  He  married  a young  lady 
named  Margaret  Reid,  and  it  was  not  many  years  before  he  was  one  of 
the  richest  men  in  Virginia,  and  his  home.  Kelson  House,  one  of  the 
principal  homes.  When  his  descendant  describes  this  old  mansion  in 
one  of  his  essays,  he  cannot  refrain  from  letting  his  fancy  dwell 
upon  the  scenes  this  stately  building  witnessed. 

"Up  the  circular 

stone  steps,  where  now  the  dust  of  the  street  lies  thick,  blushing, 
laughing  girls  have  tripped,  followed  by  stately  mammas,  over  whose 
precious  heads  the  old-time  'canopies'  were  held  by  careful  young 
lovers,  or  lordly  squires  whose  names  were  to  become  as  imperishable 
as  the  great  Declaration  which  they  subscribed.  . . . George  Mason 
and  Washington  and  Jefferson  have  slept  here;  Cornwallis  established 
his  headquarters  here  during  the  last  days  of  the  great  siege,  when 
his  first  headquarters,  Secretary  K elson ' s house,  had  been  shelled 
to  pieces.  Even  here  the  guns  aimed  by  the  master  of  the  mansion, 
then  Governor  of  Virginia  and  commander-in-chief  of  her  forces, 
reached  him  as /the  splintered  rafters  and  the  solid  shot  stuck  in  the 
wall  testify."  * 

Thomas  Kelson  of  Kelson  House  had  two  famous  sons,  William  Kel- 
son, "called  'President'  Kelson  from  his  having  been  president  of 

the  jfina ' s Council,  and,  as  such,  during  an  interregnum,  governor  of 

(2) 

the  colony",  and  Thomas  Kelson,  the  Secretary  of  the  Council.  But 
General  Thomas  Kelson,  the  son  of  the  "President",  was  the  most  fa- 
mous of  them  all.  After  completing  an  extensive  education  at  Eton 


1.  "Two  Old  Colonial  Places",  The  Old  South , XII.,  230 

2.  Ibid . , 232. 


T 


. 


* 


. 


11 


and  at  Cambridge,  and  after  winning  in  marriage  Lucy  Grymes,  a cousin 
of  Light-Horse  Harry  Lee  and  of  Thomas  Jefferson,  he  entered  heartily 


into  the  affairs  of  the  colony,  and  in  time  became  one  of  the  most 
conspicuous  of  the  patriot  leaders.  He  was 

"the  mover  in  the  great 
Virginia  Convention  of  1776  of  the  resolution  first  instructing  her 
delegates  in  Congress  to  move  that  body  to  declare  the  colonies  free 
and  independent  States: — signer  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
war  governor  of  Virginia,  and  one  of  the  most  brilliant  of  that  body 


a splendid  galaxy,  in  the  firmament  of  our 


of  great  men  who  sta^d, 
nation's  history."'1' 

In  return  for  all  his  patriotism,  however.  General  Kelson  received 
nothing  but  poverty. 

"'Then  money  was  wanted  to  pay  the  troops  and  run 
the  government,  Virginia's  credit  was  low,  but  the  governor  was  told 
that  he  could  have  plenty  on  his  personal  security,  so  he  borrowed 
the  sum  needed,  and  went  on;  v/hen  regiments  mutinied  and  refused  to 
march,  the  governor  simply  drove  over  to  Petersburg,  raised  the 
money  on  his  individual  credit,  and  paid  them  off.  Consequently, 
when  the  war  closed,  what  old  George  lias  on  declared  he  would  be  will- 
ing to  say  his  nunc  dimitti s on,  viz.  the  heritage  of  his  children  of 
a crusty  of  bread  and  liberty,  had  literally  befallen  Governor  Nel- 
son." w/ 

John  Page,  a grandson  of  Governor  John  Page,  married  Elizabeth 
Burwell  Nelson,  a granddaughter  of  Governor  Thomas  Nelson,  thus,  for 
the  second  time,  uniting  the  two  families.  They  lived  at  Oakland, 
in  Hanover  County,  and  here,  on  April  23,  1853,  was  born  to  them  a 


son,  whom  they  named  Thomas  Nelson  Page. 

No  events  of  apparent  importance  interrupted  the  quiet  of  the 
first  eight  years  of  the  lad's  life.  He  lived  surrounded  by  an  at- 
mosphere of  love  and  content,  where  little  and  big  acts  of  friendly 
good-will  towards  acquaintances  and  towards  relatives  to  the  most 
distant  degree  of  cousinship  were  of  daily  occurrence.  The  family 


1.  "Two  Old  Colonial  Places",  The  Old  South,  XII.,  232. 


2.  Ibid. . 240.  The  whole  essay  is  the  source  of  the  foregoing  facts 


IE 

of  Thomas  Nelson  Page  was  not  wealthy,  but  it  was  well-to-do,  and 
was  able  to  live  in  comfort  and  to  enjoy  the  services  of  several 
slaves.  During  these  eight  years,  the  little  boy  was  unconsciously 
absorbing  the  best  which  the  peculiar  civilization  of  the  South  had 
to  offer.  The  Page  slaves  and  those  of  all  the  neighbors  were  very 
well  taken  care  of,  with  the  negroes  living  in  trusting  dependence 
upon  their  kind  white  masters.  If  young  Thomas  witnessed  any  of  the 
disagreeable  aspects  of  the  Southern  system  of  living,  the  remem- 
brance must  have  been  driven  from  his  mind  by  the  events  of  the  ear- 
ly ’sixties,  because  there  is  little  mention  or  suggestion  of  the 
draw-backs  and  the  ills  of  the  life  of  the  negro  slaves.  Ee  seems 
always  to  have  had  the  mind  of  an  idealist,  looking  upon  evil  as 
nothing,  and  therefore  not  to  be  retained  in  the  memory,  while  think- 
ing of  good  as  the  only  thing  that  exists,  for  the  essays  and  stories 
which  he  later  wrote  deal  very  largely  with  the  relations  between 
master  and  slave,  and  with  the  Cavalier  system  of  civilization  that 
obtained  in  Virginia  and  the  South  before  the  Civil  War. 

Thomas  Nelson  Page's  father  was  very  much  of  a student,  and  con- 
sequently possessed  an  excellent  library  in  his  Oakland  home.  Thus 
Thomas  early  had  great  opportunities  to  read  the  best  that  literature 
affords.  The  books  which  most  attracted  the  boy's  attention  were  the 
Waverley  novels,  and  these  he  absorbed  industriously.  In  fact  his 

first  reading  lessons  were  given  to  him  in  these  great  romances  by 

(1) 

an  aunt,  possibly  the  original  of  "My  Cousin  Fanny",  who  also  used 

the  prayer-book  of  the  Episcopalian  church  as  a reading  text-book  for 

(2) 

the  boy.  Naturally  he  was  familiar  with  Dickens  and  Thackeray,  be 

1.  One  of  the  essays  ih  The  Burial  of  the  Guns,  II. 

2.  Harkins,  J2.F. ; little  Pils  rimag QS  Among  the  Men  Who  Have  Written 
Famous  Books , 203-4,  (L.C.Page  & Co., Boston). 


. 


, 


. 


. 


' 


. 


- 


' 


. 


. 

. 

, 


... 


13 


cause  of  the  public  which  they  had  personally  created  in  the  United 

States.  If  it  is  possible  to  judge  from  the  number  of  aGlusions 

throughout  Mr.  Page's  writings,  his  education  in  Latin  and  in  Creek 

was  very  slight.  Mo  doubt  he  had  some  instruction  in  both  languages 

but  he  has  made  little  use  of  it.  Many  of  the  references  which  do 

ape  ear  may  have  come  through  his  readings  in  Scott  and  Thackeray. 

Just  as  the  life  of  every  Southerner  was  changed  by  the  Civil 

War,  so  did  that  of  young  Thomas  suffer  a cruel  testing  during  the 

very  impressionable  years  from  eight  to  twelve.  Previously  he  had 

been  old  enough  to  see  and  to  remember  the  "Old  South",  as  he  so 
' (1) 

lovingly  calls  it,  and  during  the  war  he  could  easily  comprehend  the 
events  that  so  swiftly  and  so  ruthlessly  changed  the  whole  course  of 
Southern  life.  His  father,  although  he  did  not  desire  war,  and  was 
willing  and  ready  to  free  his  slaves,  if  such  an  act  would  help  to 
ease  the  strained  feelings  between  Northern  and  Southern  interests, 
unquest ioningly  threw  in  his  lot  with  his  state,  when  its  legisla- 
ture voted  to  secede,  and  enlisted  as  a private  in  the  Confederate 
Army.  The  first  two  years  were  fairly  quiet  ones  at  Oakland,  and 
Mrs.  Page  had  little  difficulty  in  superint ending  the  plantation  and 

in  providing  for  the  needs  of  her  family  and  her  servants.  Then  the 

(2) 

war  came  near  the  plantation,  and  afterwards  it  was  a very  severe 
test  of  her  ingenuity  to  orovide  food  and  contrive  clothing  for 
those  in  her  care.  At  the  end  of  the  war.  Major  Page,  for  Thomas's 
father  had  rapidly  risen  from  the  ranks,  came  home  to  a ruined  plan- 
tation, with  poverty  staring  from  the  land  which  had,  only  four  years 
before,  smiled  with  prosperity.  These  years  of  the  war  and  of  the 

1.  Title  of  the  first  essay  in  Volume  XII. 

2.  Harkins,  2.F. ; Lit tl e Pilgrirnag es  etc . . 205. 


. 


f 


- 


- 


, 


. 


. 


, 


. 


. . 


14 


reconstruc tion  which  came  after  we re  the  troublesome  times  which 
taught  young  Thomas  much  and  gave  him  the  voluminous  information 
from  which  he  later  chose  material  for  his  writings. 

In  1869,  at  the  age  of  sixteen,  young  Page  entered  Washington 
and  Lee  University,  where  he  was  privileged  to  study  under  the  direc- 
tion of  General  Robert  E.  Lee,  who  always  represented  to  Thomas  the 
very  flower  of  Southern  gentlemanliness.  He  completed  his  college 
work  in  1872,  and  went  to  teach  in  a private  school  in  Kentucky  for 
a year.  Then  he  returned  to  Virginia,  and  entered  the  Law  School  at 
the  University  of  Virginia,  from  which,  in  1874  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
one,  he  obtained  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Lav/.  In  1875,  he  set  up 
the  practice  of  law  in  Richmond,  where  he  lived  for  the  next  eighteen 

years.  Luring  this  oeriod,  however,  he  gradually  took  up  the  writing 

(1) 

of  short  stories  and  of  noetry,  and  he  also  spent  some  time  in  lec- 

(2) 

turing;  for,  since  he  was  vitally  interested  in  the  South,  he  found 
that  through  these  two  means  he  had  an  opportunity  to  explain  the 
South  to  the  North,  and  thus  help  to  reconcile  the  differences  be- 
tween the  two  great  bodies  of  people. 

It  is  quite  significant  that  the  first  published  bit  from  the 
pen  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page  should  be  poetry,  because  he  was  living  in 
the  transition  period  when  American  literature  was  changing  from 
poetry  to  prose.  The  earliest  writings  of  these  few  years  were  more 
often  in  poetry  than  in  prose,  and  the  verse  was  usually  dialectic, 
rather  than  literary.  So  Mr.  Page  ran  very  true  to  the  form  of  his 

day  when  he  produced  ”Unc 1 2 3 Gabe's  White  Polks”,  which  was  published 

, . (3) 

in  Scribner  s in  167  6.  Nothing  else  of  Mr.  Page's  appeared  for  eight 

1.  Harkins , E.P . ; Little  Pilgrimages  etc.,  206-9. 

2.  Preface  to  Th e Old  South,  XII. 

3.  Now  included  in  The  Coast  of  Bohemia,  X. 


f 


. 


1 


15 


years,  and  then  in  1884  The  Century  Magazine  published  ”Marse  Chan”. 

The  editor  had  bought  the  story  from  the  young  author  two  or  three 

years  previously,  and  had  then  been  afraid  to  risk  the  venture  of 

producing  anything  so  radically  different  from  the  usual  sort  of 

current  literature,  for  it  was  both  a short-story  and  in  dialect. 

It  was  not  until  Mr.  Page  wrote  to  ascertain  the  fate  of  his  story 

that  the  editor  of  the  magazine  dared  to  let  it  be  urinted.  Its  suc- 

(1) 

cess  was  electrically  instantaneous . 

Throughout  his  boyhood  and  young  manhood,  Thomas  Page  had  been 
accustomed  to  a very  quiet,  dignified  manner  of  living.  Both  his 
father  and  his  mother  had  been  content  with  the  serenity  and  simplic- 
ity of  the  home  life  to  which  the  remoteness  of  their  plantation 
contributed,  and  the  young  lawyer  had  continued  to  live  calmly  and 
placidly  during  his  early  years  in  Richmond.  The  appearance  of 
"Marse  Chan”,  however,  forced  Mr.  Page  out  of  his  seclusion.  He  was 
continually  being  invited  out;  he  was  in  great  demand  at  social  af- 
fairs. The  claims  of  society  upon  him  increased  in  1886,  when  he 
married  Miss  Anne  Sedden  Bruce,  a niece  of  the  former  Confederate 
Attorney  General. 

To  his  wife,  even  before  their  marriage,  Mr.  Page  often  told 
stories  of  the  Southern  negroes  he  knew  so  well.  He  could  mimic 
their  speech  exactly.  More  than  that,  he  could  make  appear,  beneath 
the  cloak  of  dialect,  the  very  spirit  and  essence  of  the  negro  char- 
acter and  thought.  Mrs.  Page  was  quick  to  appreciate  the  importance 
of  her  husband's  ability,  and  it  really  was  because  she  encouraged 
her  husband  to  transfer  these  impromptu  recitations  to  paper  that 
Mr.  Page  seriously  considered  a literary  career. 


1.  Harkins,  E.P.;  Littl e Pilgrimages  etc..  201;  210 


1 


. 

. 

- 


Vt  • 


, 


: 


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- 


. 

. 

_ 


16 


The  two  years  after  his  marriage  were  very  fruitful  ones  for 
Mr.  Page.  In  1887  he  published  his  best-known  work,  "In  Ole  Virgi- 
nia”, a little  volume  of  short-stories  and  sketches  of  Southern  life. 
The  same  year  he  was  honored  with  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Literature 
by  Washington  and  Lee  University.  In  1888  aooeared  "Two  Little  Con- 
federates", which  is  really,  under  a thin  disguise,  an  account  of 
his  own  experiences  on  the  Oakland  plantation  during  the  Civil  War. 

In  this  year  also,  in  collaboration  with  Arraistead  C.  Cordon,  Mr. 

Page  published  a little  volume  of  poems  under  the  suggestive  title, 
"Befo'  de  War",  that  time  on  which  he  loves  best  to  linger  in 
thought. 

Suddenly,  late  in  1888,  Mrs.  Page  died,  and  everything  was  again 
changed  for  the  husband.  He  retired  from  social  and  literary  life, 
going  back  into  the  quiet  seclusion  he  had  known  previously.  Nothing 
new  from  hi  3 pen  appeared  in  print  for  three  years.  During  this 
time,  however,  his  thoughts  must  have  dwelt  often  upon  his  wife's  de- 
sire for  him  to  devote  himself  to  literature,  for  he  finally  decided 
to  give  up  the  practice  of  law  in  favor  of  writi ng.  Whatever  may 
have  been  the  exact  reasons  for  his  change  of  occiipati ons , the  fact 

is  that  Mr.  Page  went,  in  1891,  to  New  York  City,  where  he  succeeded 

(1) 

Charles  Dudley  Warner  in  conducting  "The  Drawer"  in  Ham  er 1 s Monthly. 
Soon  afterwards  came  "The  Old  South",  his  first  book  of  essays,  and 
"On  Newfound  F.iver",  his  first  attemot  at  a long  narrative. 

In  1893  Mr.  Page  went  to  Chicago  to  visit  an  uncle  and  aunt, 
who  lived  in  what  was  then  the  fashionable  residence  district,  the 
South  Side.  Once  more  he  glimpsed  society,  and  again  he  took  an  in- 
terest in  it.  This  time  the  center  of  his  attraction  w as  Mrs.  Plo- 

1.  $arkin3,  -S.F. ; Lit tl e Pilgrimag  es  etc. , 214. 


. 


, 


1 


. 


■ 


. 


. 


. 


■ 

♦ 

, 

, 

' 


« 


17 


ranee  Pathrop  Field,  the  wealthy  widow  of  Henry  Field  of  Chicago,  and 
the  grand-daughter  of  Governor  Barbour  of  Virginia.  Within  a f ew 
months  Thomas  Page  and  Mrs.  Field  were  married.  They  moved  after- 
wards to  Washington,  P.  C.,  and  Mr.  Page  definitely  gave  himself  up 
to  literary  work. 

From  1893  to  1908,  almost  every  year  at  least  one  book,  and  of- 
ten two  or  three,  appeared  as  the  resiHt  of  Mr.  Page's  industry. 

More  and  more  fame  came  to  him.  Southern  colleges  conferred  honor- 
ary degrees  upon  him,  and,  in  1901,  Yale  University  recognized  his 
ability  by  giving  him  the  degree  of  Poctor  of  literature.  Puring 
this  period  Mr.  Page  made  a radical  departure  from  the  field  in  which 
he  had  been  so  successful,  by  publishing,  in  1898,  "Red  Rock",  a long 
novel  dealing  with  the  days  of  Reconstruction  in  the  South.  The 
story  was  well  received  by  the  public,  and  it  has  retained  its  popu- 
larity, especially  among  young  readers,  because  of  its  stirring  ac- 
tion, but  it  seems  to  mark  the  end  of  the  writing  into  which  Mr.  Page 
most  truly  put  himself. 

Although  many  stories  from  his  pen  appeared  in  the  next  ten 
years,  they  deal,  in  the  main,  with  men  and  women  who  live  in  the 
world  of  society.  It  is  perhaps  true  that  Mr.  Page  felt  that  the 
taste  of  the  reading -public  was  changing,  and  that  the  general  in- 
terest was  no  longer  in  the  retired  portions  of  the  United  States. 
Because  of  the  radical  changes  made  in  his  own  life  by  his  second 
marriage,  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  him  not  to  have  realized 
how  the  great  cities  had  been  growing  until  their  influence  was  very 
dominant. 

Mrs.  Page  was  a very  sweet,  charming  woman,  totally  unaffected 
by  the  life  of  fashion  in  which  she  had  so  prominent  a position. 


. 


18 


She  controlled  an  immense  fortune,  and  she  had  social  and  financial 
interests,  not  only  in  the  Hast  and  in  the  West,  but  across  the  At- 
lantic as  well.  The  Washington  home  of  the  Pages  was  the  scene  of 
many  great  functions,  and  many  important  people  from  the  United 
States  and  from  abroad  were  entertained  there.  Mrs.  Page's  two 
daughters  married  Snglishmen,  and  went  across  the  ocean  to  live.  The 
Pages  themselves  often  travelled.  So,  quite  naturally,  Mr.  Page  was 
led  to  think  of  other  things  than  the  far-off  days  of  the  Old  South. 

But,  for  all  that  his  literary  interests  changed  with  the  times, 
Mr.  Page  himself  did  not  change.  He  still  loved  quiet  and  tranquil- 
lity. His  part  was  rather  that  of  an  onlooker  upon  the  whirl  within 
his  own  home  than  that  of  a participant.  Preserving  the  Cavalier 
gallantry  of  the  ante-bellum  South,  he  formed  a calm  relief  to  the 
briskness  of  the  twentieth-century  customs  of  society. 

It  gradually  became  Mr.  Page's  duty  to  act  as  a sort  of  combi- 
nation employment-agent  and  father-confessor  for  a 13.  his  many  rela- 
tives and  friends  from  Virginia.  Some  he  helped  with  money,. if  money 
was  what  they  needed.  Others  he  furnished  with  advice.  For  some  he 
found  work,  and  for  others  he  suggested  tasks.  He  was,  from  all  this 
"Cousin  Tom"  to  hundreds.  One  woman  desired  earnestly  his  influence 
in  getting  her  stories  published.  Her  literary  talent' was  negative, 
but  Mr.  Page  could  not  tell  her  so.  Instead  he  looked  at  her  and 
said,  "Cousin,  can  you  make  'beat'  biscuit?"  She  glanced  up, 
astonished  at  his  question,  because  she  prided  herself  on  this  par- 
ticular item  of  the  culinary  art.  "Of  course,  I can  make  'beat' 
biscuit.  Cousin  Tom."  Since  then  this  woman  has  made  thousands  of 
dollars  from  a tea-room,  all  through  a simple  suggestion  from  one 
whose  sympathies  have  always  been  with  his  native  state. 


. 


' 


« 


I 

, 


' 


. 


* 


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18 


Very  early  in  the  new  century,  Mr.  Page  returned  to  the  law, 

putting  his  especial  attention  noon  matters  of  international  signi- 

(1) 

fieance,  no  doubt  attracted  in  that  direction  by  his  intimate  ac- 
quaintance with  foreign  diplomats  both  in  his  own  home  and  in  3iro- 
pean  capitals.  In  taking  up  his  new  work  Mr.  Page  was  unconsciously 
preparing  himself  for  the  honor  and  the  task  which  came  to  him  in 
1913,  when  President  Woodrow  Wilson  appointed  him  ambassador  extra- 
ordinary and  plenipotentiary  to  Italy.  Eis  friends,  both  literary 
and  noli ti cal,  enthusiastically  greeted  the  announcement  of  this 
choice,  and  one  of  them,  Robert  Bridges,  the  American  poet,  read  the 

following  poem  at  one  of  the  farewell  dinners  given  to  Mr.  Page  be- 

(2) 

fore  he  left  for  Rome: 


MARS  TOM  AT  CO'TR 

Sarvent  MarsterJ  Is  dis  de  co'te 

Whar  my  Marse  Tom  is  'bleeged  to  go. 

Warin'  short  pants  and  his  best  coat  -- 
lookin'  mighty  grand,  I tell  you  so? 

You'd  know?  'Bassadur,  he  is  — 

Bigger'n  President,  sho'  it  is! 

Golly  boy,  is  you  de  King 
Warin'  all  dat  lace  an'  gol' 

Powder 'haid,  an'  big  brass  ring. 

And  stuffed  wid  all  de  pride  you. 'll  hoi'? 

Well,  I 'clar'  ter  Gora.'  A sarvin'  manJ 
And  I done  think  you  royal  and  gran' I 

Yes,  suh;  I'se  Unc ' Gabe,  Marse  Page's  man, 
I raise  dat  chile,  an'  hoi'  his  han' 

And  tuk  him  to  school  an'  writ  his  books 
And  brung  him  up  to  min'  his  looks. 

Ray  ain'  miffin'  dat  boy  knows 

I ain'  put  on  him  wid  his  clo'es. 


1.  Halsey,  Francis  Whiting;  American  Authors  and  Th ei r Pomes,  184 
(James  Pott  and  Comuany,  ll  ew  York,  19  Jl) 

2.  Bookman . 37:  605,  August,  1913. 


. 


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' 


' 

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20 


All  &e  folkses  he  writ  about 

Were  ' zackly  as  I form'  ’em  out; 

Gordon  Keith,  Meh  Lady,  an'  Marse  Chan, 

Doctor  Cary  and  dat  nigger  Sam, 

Mistress  Polly  and  Jacquelin  Gray 
Were  fren's  o'  mine,  an'  people  3ay 
Dat  Marse  Tom  woundn'  'a'  got  to  co'te 

fif  he  didn't  wrote  'em  down  jes  ez  I tho't. 

Par's  de  King?  He  sut'nly  is  quality.' 

You  tell  dat  King  Marse  Tom's  as  good  ez  he; 

B'  ain'  miffin'  Ole  Ferginyer,  I know 
Better' n our  folks  is  — jes  sol 
An'  when  America  wants  her  bes' 

Ole  Ferginyer  leads  all  de  res'  — 

Be  Presiden',  Marse  Tom  an'  me 
Is  jes'  a few  of  de  quality. 

Bow  yo'  haid,  you  onnery  cus  — 

Bat's  Marse  Tom  a 'lookin'  at  usJ 

In  1914  there  occurred  a fearful  earthquake  in  the  Duchy  of 
Abruzzi,  Italy,  and  at  that  time  Mr.  Page  was  very  active  in  the  re- 
lief of  the  misery  and  suffering  of  the  wretched  peasants.  From  the 
graphic  account  which  he  sent  to  Scribner' s Magaz in e in  the  spring 

of  1915,  however,  it  is  impossible,  unless  it  is  to  be  discovered  be- 

(1) 

tween  the  lines,  to  find  mention  of  his  personal  endeavors. 

During  the  last  few  years  Mr.  Page  has  been  called  upon  to  bear 
much  grief.  In  1915  occurred  the  death  of  Francis  Hopkinson  Smith, 
one  of  his  closets  friends.  In  1919,  John  Fox,  who  was  a very  inti- 
mate friend  of  the  Page  family  and  who  often  visited  them  in  Wash- 
ington, passed  away.  Among  the  latest  published  writings  by  Mr. 

Page  are  eulogies  of  the  lives  and  the  works  of  these  well-known 

( 2) 

novelists.  The  greatest  sorrow  of  all,  however,  was  the  sudden 
death  of  Mrs.  Page  in  the  late  spring  of  1921,  while  Mr.  and  Mrs. 

Page  were  staying  with  one  of  her  daughters  near  Boston.  Since  his 
bereavement  Mr.  Page  has  socnt  most  of  the  time  in  California. 


1.  "Earthquake  in  the  Abruzzi",  Scribner 1 s Maaazin e.  57:419-30, 
April,  1915 . 

2.  "Francis  Houkinson  Smith",  Scribner' s Magazin e,  58:304-13,  S.'15 

and  "John  Fox" . ibid. r 66:674-83T  D.  '19.  __  _ 


r I I 


' 


' 


. 


' 

• . 


. 


- 


. 


21 


Mr.  Page  is  not  of  the  tall,  dark  branch  of  his  family,  but  is 
short  and  ruddy,  with  sandy  hair.  It  seems  a fortunate  thing  that 
available  portraits  of  Mr.  Page  toere  taken  several  years  ago,  so  that 
the  fashion  of  the  clothes  he  wears  in  them  is  sufficiently  out  of 
the  present  style  to  suggest  a former  day  altogether.  Mr.  Page  be- 
longs so  naturally  to  a past  generation  that  it  would  seem  almost  in- 
harmonious to  picture  him  in  strictly  modern  dress.  The  soft,  neu- 
tral grays  of  the  garments,  fitting  so  smoothly  over  his  erect, 
slightly  corpulent  figure,  suggest  the  quiet  courtesy  of  the  man. 

Eis  smile  is  gentle  and  humorous,  passing  from  his  lips  uuward  to 

(1) 

center  in  his  jolly,  twinkling  eyes. 


1.  The  writer  of  this  thesis  is  deenly  indebted  for  much  of  his  in- 
formation about  the  life  of  Mr.  Thomas  Nelson  Page  to  the  Rever 
end  John  Mitchell  Page,  Episcopalian  chanlain  at  the  University 
of  Illinois.  Reverend  Page  is  a cousin  both  of  Mr.  Thomas  Pag e 
and  of  Mrs.  Florence  Field  Page. 


22 


III.  TH B OLD  SOUTH  AS  MR.  PAG  3 PORTRAYS  IT. 


For  Mr.  Page  the  Old  South,  — that  is,  the  peculiar  civiliza- 
tion evolved  in  Virginia  and  her  sister  states  below  the  Mason  and 
Dixon  Line,  — was  an  aristocracy  as  intricate  in  its  construction 
and  as  elaborate  in  its  code,  as  was  the  Cavalier  society  from  which 
came  the  progenitors  of  most  of  the  great  Southern  families.  This 
aristocracy  was  not  oerfect,  since  it  was  founded  by  human  brains; 
but,  when  Mr.  Page  conjures  up  visions  of  its  former  glory,  roseate- 
ly  colored  by  the  dream-light  with  which  the  recollections  of  early 
youth  are  always  tinted,  it  becomes  an  institution  almost  "devoutly 
to  be  wished" . 

On  the  part  of  the  white  people  of  the  Old  South,  training  and 
tradition  had  taught  them  to  be  masters  of  property  end  to  direct 
the  work  of  servants. 

"Virginia  was  settled  with  a strong  Snglish 
feeling  ingrained  in  her,  with  Shglish  customs  and  habits  of  life, 
with  .English  ideas  modified  only  to  suit  the  conditions  of  existence 
here.  Among  the  chief  factors  which  influenced  the  Virginia  life 
and  moulded  it  in  its  peculiar  form  were  this  Jhglish  feeling  . . .; 
the  aristocratic  tendency*  the  happy  combination  of  soil,  climate 
and  agricultural  product  (tobacco),  which  made  them  an  agricultural 
people,  and  enabled  them  to  support  a generous  style  of  living  as 
landed  gentry;  the  Church  with  its  strong  organi zation;  and  the  in- 
stitution of  slavery."  1 

The  earliest  colonists  in  Virginia  settled  along  the  rivers  on 
large  plantations,  and  were  thus  easy  of  access  to  traders,  who 
brought  them  African  slaves  and  indentured  servants  from  .ihgland  to 
help  cultivate  the  land. 

"The  existence  of  slaves  emphasized 
. "Life  in  Colonial  Virginia",  The  Old  South,  XII,  121-22.  


1 


• 

* 

• 

• 

. 

. 


. 


. 


. 

’ 

. . . 


• 

• 

. 

I 


23 


the  class  distinction  and  created  a system  of  castes,  making  the  so^t 
cial  system  of  Virginia  as  strongly  aristocratic  as  that  in  Eigland. 

The  tendency  was  further  strengthened  both  by  the  royal  governors, 
men  of  rank  who  came  over  and  set  up  splendid  vice-regal  establish- 
ments, and  by  the  prevalence  of  the  English  system  of  primogeniture 
and  of  entail. 

"Yet  there  was  that  in  the  Virginians  which  distin- 
guished them,  for  all  their  aristocratic  pretensions,  from  their 
British  cousins.  Grafted  on  the  ari stocrati c instinct  was  a jealous 
watchfulness  of  their  liberties,  which  developed  into  a sterling  re- 
publicanism, notwithstanding  the  aristocratic  instinct.  The  standard 
was  not  birth  nor  family  connection;  it  was  one  based  on  individual 
attainment. ” 1 2 

So  it  was,  after  all,  an  aristocracy  such  as  only  America  could  have 
produced,  an  aristocracy  permeated  with  democracy. 

The  various  factors  of  religious,  political,  and  economic  belief 
that  were  gradually  shaping  the  different  American  colonies  had  their 
effect  upon  Virginia,  and,  while  molding  the  growing  American  nation 
as  a whole,  helped  to  make  the  Virginian  aristocracy  probably  the 
best  and  most  perfect  aristocracy  ever  known,  one  in  which  Christian- 
ity, neighborliness,  and  brotherhood  played  a decided  part.  Those 
who  lived  then,  and  who  live  now,  in  the  world  outside  of  the  South, 
have  believed  that  the 


"people  lived  a life  of  idleness  and  -ease,  a 
kind  of  1 hammock- swung ' , ' sherbet- sinning  1 existence,  fanned  by 
slaves,  and,  in  their  pride,  served  on  bended  knees.  No  conception 
could  be  further  from  the  truth.  The  ease  of  the  master  of  a big 
plantation  was  about  that  of  the  head  of  any  big  institution  where 
numbers  of  operatives  are  employed;  and  to  the  management  of  which 
are  added  the  responsibilities  of  the  care  and  complete  mastership  of 
the  liberty  of  his  operatives  and  their  families.  His  work  was  ge- 
nerally sufficiently  systematized  to  admit  of  enough  personal  inde- 
pendence to  enable  him  to  participate  in  the  duties  of  hospitality, 
but  any  master  who  had  a successfully  conducted  plantation  was  sure 
to  have  given  it  his  personal  supervision  with  an  unrerni tting  at- 
tention which  would  not  have  failed  to  secure  success  in  any  other 
calling.  If  this  was  true  of  the  master,  it  was  much  more  so  of  the 

1.  "Life  in  Colonial  Virginia",  The  Old  South . XII,  124. 

2.  Ibid.,  127-8. 


. 


. 


. 


■ . 


■ . 

' 

M 


. 


24 


mistress.  The  master  might,  by  having  a good  overseer  and  reliable 
headmen,  shift  a portion  of  the  burden  from  his  shoulders;  the  mis- 
tress had  no  such  means  of  relief.  She  was  the  necessary  and  invari- 
able functionary;  the  keystone  of  the  domestic  economy  which  bound 
all  the  rest  of  the  structure  and  gave  it  its  strength  and  beauty. 
From  early  morn  till  morn  again  the  most  important  and  delicate  con- 
cerns of  the  plantation  were  her  charge  and  care.  From  superintend- 
ing the  setting  of  the  turkeys  to  fighting  a pestilence,  there  was 
nothing  that  was  not  her  work.  She  was  mistress,  manager,  doctor, 
nurse,  counsellor,  seamstress,  teacher,  housekeeper,  slave,  all  at 
once.  She  was  at  the  beck  and  call  of  every  one  . • • " 1 

(2) 

In  an  article  published  in  19u4,  Mr.  Page  urges  the  necessity 
of  considering  the  negroes  as  human  beings  who  have  as  many  grada- 
tions of  class  distinction  as  white  men.  As  a race  he  feels  there 
is  no  doubt  of  the  fact  that  the  black  is  inferior  to  the  white.  As 
individuals,  however,  there  are  negroes  of  great  moral  and  intellec- 
tual superiority.  In  the  days  of  Southern  agitation,  though,  there 
was  a great  tendency  on  the  part  of  the  North  to  think  that  the  ne- 
groes could  conduct  themselves  as  good  citizens,  were  they  given  a 
chance;  and  it  was  generally  believed  that  they  were  kept  in  a con- 
dition of  down-trodden  serfdom  by  their  masters.  The  Northerners 
failed  to 

’’consider  that  large  numbers  of  this  class  held  positions  of 
responsibility  and  trust,  which  they  discharged  ’with  a fidelity  and 
success  that  is  the  strongest  proof  of  the  potentiality  of  the  race. 
They  do  not  reckon  that  warm  friendship  which  existed  between  master 
and  servant,  and  which  more  than  any  other  one  thing  gives  promise 
of  future  and  abiding  friendship  between  the  races /When  left  to  set- 
tle their  relations  without  outside  interference.” 

The  propaganda  of  the  North  did  much  to  disseminate  the  errone- 
ous idea  that  the  plantations  were  worked  by  great  numbers  of  slaves, 
who  toiled  till  they  were  exhausted  during  the  long,  hot  days,  and 
then  crouched  at  night  in  filthy  dungeons,  their  backs  bleeding  from 


1.  ’’Social  Life  in  Old  Virginia”,  The  Old  South,  XII.,  184-5. 

2.  ’’The  Disfranchisement  of  the  Negro”,  Scribner's  Magazine. 

36:15-24,  July,  1904. 

3.  ’’The  Old-Time  Negro”.  The  Old  South.  XII.,  302. 


, 


. 


25 


the  open  wounds  of  whip  lashes. 

"There  were  great  estates,  hut  they 
were  not  numerous.  There  were,  possibly,  a score  of  persons  in  Vir- 
ginia who  owned  over  three  hundred  slaves,  and  ten  or  a dozen  who 
owned  over  five  hundred.  Such  estates  were  kept  up  in  a certain 
style  which  almost  always  accompanies  large  wealth.  But  the  great 
majority  of  the  plantations  in  Virginia,  and,  . . .,  elsewhere, 
however  extensive  were  the  lands,  were  modest  and  simple,  and  the  re- 
lation between  masters  and  servants  was  one  of  close  personal  ac- 
quaintance and  friendliness,  beginning  at  the  cradle  and  scarcely 
ending  at  the  grave." 

It  is  sadly  unfortunate  that  misunderstandings  between  the  Worth 
and  the  South  should  have  resulted  in  the  forced  sapping  and  eventual 
death  of  the  Southern  aristocratic  civilization. 

"Truly  it  was  a 

charming  life.  There  was  a vast  waste;  but  it  was  not  loss.  %ery 
one  had  food,  every  one  had  raiment,  every  one  had  peace.  There  was 
not  wealth  in  the  base  sense  in  which  we  know  it  and  strive  for  it 
and  trample  down  others  for  it  now.  But  there  was  wealth  in  the  good 
old  sense  in  which  the  litany  of  our  fathers  used  it.  There  was 
weal.  There  was  the  best  of  all  wealth;  there  was  content,  and  'a 
quiet  mind  is  richer  than  a crown*.  . . . 

"That  the  social  life  of  the  Old  South  had  its  faults  I am  far 
from  denying.  What  civilization  has  not?  But  its  virtues  far  out- 
weigh them;  its  virtues  were  never  equalled.  For  all  its  faults, 
it  wa3,  I believe,  the  purest,  sweetest  life  ever  lived.  It  has  been 
claimed  that  it  was  non-productive,  that  it  fostered  sterility.  Only 
ignorance  or  folly  could  make  the  assertion.  It  largely  contributed 
to  produce  this  nation;  it  led  its  armies  and  its  navies;  it  estab- 
lished this  government  so  firmly  that  not  even  it  could  overthrow 
it;  it  opened  up  the  great  West;  it  added  Xouisiana  and  Texas,  and 
more  than  trebled  out  territory;  it  Christianized  the  negro  race  in 
a little  over  two  centuries,  impressed  upon  it  regard  for  order, 
and  gave  it  the  only  civilization  it  has  ever  possessed  since  the 
dawn  of  history.  It  has  maintained  the  supremacy  of  the  Caucasian 
race,  upon  which  all  civilization  seems  now  to  depend.  It  produced 
a people  whose  heroic  fight  against  the  forces  of  the  world  has  en- 
riched the  annals  of  the  human  race  — a people  whose  fortitude  in 
defeat  has  been  even  more  solendid  than  their  valor  in  war.  It  made 
men  noble,  gentle,  and  brave,  and  women  tender  and  pure  and  true.  It 
may  have  fallen  short  in  material  development  in  its  narrower  sense, 
but  it  abounded  in  spiritual  development;  it  made  the  domestic 
virtues  as  common  as  light  and  air,  and  filled  homes  with  purity  and 
peace. 

"It  has  passed  from  the  earth,  but  it  has  left  its  benignant  in- 
fluence to  sweeten  and  sustain  its  children.  The  ivory  palaces  have 
been  destroyed,  bu^giijiyrrh , aloes,  and  cassia  still  breathe  amid  their 
dismantled  ruins." 

1.  "The  Old-Time  Hegro",  Th  e 01 d S outh . XII.,  306-7. 

2.  "Social  Xjfq  in  Old  Virginia",  ibid.,  220-1.  


V 


. 


. 

, 

. 


. 

. 

■ 

- 


’ 


26 


IV.  "IN  OX* S VIRGINIA" • 


"Marse  Chan",  which  first  appeared  in  1884  in  The  C entu  ry  , was 
published  again  in  1887,  together  wi th  five  more  short-stories  of 
Southern  life:  the  little  book  was  significantly  entitled  "In  Ole 
Virginia”.  In  these  little  tales  there  is  an  interplay  of  joy  and 
sorrow,  of  sunshine  and  shadow,  of  the  old  life  of  aristocracy  and 
the  new  era  of  poverty,  that  charms  the  reader  until  he  forgets  him- 
self and  his  surrounding s , and  wanders  happily  in  the  land  of  Mr. 
Page's  imagination. 

It  is  always  interesting  to  know  the  facts  that  lie  behind  the 
writing  of  any  important  niece  of  literature,  and  Mr.  Page  has  for- 
tunately recorded  the  little  incident  that  induced  him  to  write 
"Marse  Chan". 

"Just  then  a friend  showed  me  a letter  which  had  been 
written  by  a young  girl  to  her  sweetheart  in  a Georgia  regiment, 
telling  him  that  she  loved  him,  after  all,  and  that  if  he  would  get 
a furlough  and  come  home  she  would  marry  him;  that  she  had  loved  him 
ever  since  they  had  gone  to  school  together  in  the  little  school- 
house  in  the  woods.  Then,  as  if  she  feared  such  a temptation  might 
be  too  strons  for  him,  she  added  a postscript  in  these  words;  'Don't 
come  without  a furlough;  for  if  you  don't  come  honorable,  I won't 
marry  you.'  This  letter  had  been  taken  from  the  pocket  of  a private 
dead  on  the  battlefield  of  one  of  the  battles  around  Richmond,  and, 
as  the  date  was  only  a week  before  the  battle  occurred,  its  pathos 
struck  me  very  much.  I remember  I said:  'The  poor  fellow  got  his 

furlough  through  a bullet.'  The  idea  remained  with  me,  and  I went 
to  my  office  one  morning  ancL  began  to  write  'Marse  Chan',  which  I 
finished  in  about  a week." 

Mr.k  Page  has  used  this  incident  as  the  foundation  for  two  plots. 

With  its  chief  characters  taxen  from  among  the  extremely  poor  white 

of  a very  remote  district  of  Virginia,  it  has  been  develooed  into 

(2) 

"Little  Darby",  with  the  word3,  "Don't  come  without  a furlough;  for 

1.  Toulmin,  Harry  A.,  Jr.,  Social  Hi  storiarts . 9-10 . (Gorham  Press, 
Boston,  1911.) 

2.  In  The  Burial  of  the  Gun3,  II . 


- 


. 


. 


r 


i 


1 

27 


if  you  don't  come  honorable,  I won't  marry  you”,  introduced  verbatim 
at  the  turning-point  of  the  story.  For  "Marse  Chan”  only  a uart  of 
the  incident  has  been  taken.  In  his  expansion  of  this  fragment  Mr. 
Page  set  a high  mar^  for  himself  which  he  has  never  surpassed,  for 
he  has  not  always  been  entirely  successful  in  the  development  of 
plot.  Some  of  his  stories  give  the  impression  that  his  skill  and 
imagination  have  not  been  able  to  cope  with  the  framework  of  the 
narrative.  If  the  stories  are  worth  reading,  it  is  because  of  some- 
thing other  than  the  plot.  This  criticism,  however,  cannot  be  made 
of  his  first  story,  for,  with  a rare  invention  of  plot,  he  has  de- 
veloped his  original,  using  but  a small  part  of  it,  until  an  excel- 
lent story,  which  he  has  never  succeeded  in  equalling,  has  resulted. 

The  story  is  told  by  Sam,  an  old  negro  who  was  formerly  the 
body-servant  of  young  Channing,  the  central  figure.  The  reproduc- 
tion of  the  ante-bellum  Virginia  life  is  all  the  more  successful  be- 
cause it  is  seen  through  the  eyes  of  this  reminiscent  old  darky,  and 
because  it  is  described  in  the  soft,  melting  accents  of  his  Southern 
dialect. 

”Marse  Chan's”long  courtship  of  Anne  Chamberlain  is  summed  up  in 
old  Sam's  account  of  the  meeting  of  the  two  young  people  on  the  even' 
ing  before  Marse  Chan  left  for  the  army: 

,rDen  Marse  Chan  he  went  on 

talkin',  right  fars'  to  her;  an'  he  tole  her  how  he  had  loved  her 
ever  3ence  she  wuz  a little  bit  o'  baby  mos',  an'  how  he  nuver  'mem- 
bered  de  time  when  he  hadn'  'suected  to  marry  her.  Ke  told  her  it 
wuz  his  love  for  her  dat  hed  made  ' im  stan'  fust  at  school  an'  col- 
lide, an'  hed  kep'  ' im  good  an'  pure;  an'  now  he  wuz  gwine  'way, 
would 'n  she  let  it  be  lixe  ' twuz  in  old  times,  an'  ef  he  come  back 
from  de  war  would 'n  she  try  to  think  on  him  ez  she  use'  to  do  when 
she  wuz  a little  guihl?”  1 

"Old  Marster  Chan"  was  a loyal  Whig,  while  Colonel  Chamberlain, 

1.  ferse  Chan” , In  Ole. Virginia. (Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  New  York, 

1687),  27. 


28 


his  friend  and  the  owner  of  the  adjoining  plantation,  was  a staunch 
Democrat*  A breach  appeared  in  the  intimacy  between  the  two  fami- 
lies when  the  two  fathersran  for  Congress  on  their  respective  party 
platforms.  The  ,Told  marster"  won  the  race. 

"Dat  made  old  Cun'l 

Chahrab'lin  mighty  mad",  --  the  old  narrator  explains,  — ’’and  dey 
stopt  visitin’  each  urr  reg'lar,  like  dye  had  been  doin'  all  ’long. 
Den  Cun'l  Chahrab'lin  he  sort  o'  sot  in  debt,  an'  sell  some  o'  he 
niggers,  an'  dat's  de  way  be  fuss  begun.  Dat's  whar  de  lawsuit  cum 
from.  Ole  marster  he  didn't  lixe  nobody  to  sell  niggers,  an'  know- 
in'  dat  Cun'l  Chahrab'lin  wuz  soilin'  o'  his,  he  writ  an'  offered  to 
buy  his  M' ria  an'  all  her  chil'en,  'cause  she  had  married  our 
Zeek’yel.  An'  don'  yo'  think,  Cun'l  Chahrab'lin  axed  old  marster  mo1 
'n  th'ee  niggers  wuz  wuth  fur  M' ria!  Befo'  old  marster  bought  her, 
dough,  de  sheriff  cum  an'  levelled  on  M*  ria  an'  a whole  parcel  o' 
urr  niggers.  Ole  marster  he  went  to  de  sale,  an'  bid  for  'em;  but 
Cun'l  Chahrab'lin  he  got  some  one  to  bid  'g'inst  old  marster.  Dey 
wuz  knocked  out  to  ole  marster  dough,  an'  den  dey  hed  a big  lawsuit, 
an'  old  marster  wuz  agwine  to  co't,  off  an'  on,  fur  some  years,  till 
at  lars ' de  co't  decided  dat  M'ria  belonged  to  ole  marster.  Ole 
Cun'l  C hah- mb ' lin  den  wuz  so  mad  he  sued  ole  marster  for  alittle 
strip  o'  lan'  down  ayah  on  de  line  fence,  whar  he  said  belonged  to 
' im.  hVybody  knowed  hit  belonged  to  ole  marster.  JSf  yo ' go  down 
dyah  now,  I kin  show  it  to  yo' , inside  de  line  fence,  whar  it  hed 
done  bin  ever  since  long  befo'  Cun'l  Chahrab'lin  wuz  born.  But  Cun'l 
Chahrab'lin  wuz  a mons'us  perseverin'  man,  an'  ole  marster  he  wouldn* 
let  nobody  run  over  'im.  Wo,  dat  he  wouldn' I So  dey  wuz  agwine 
down  to  co about  dat,  fur  I don'  know  how  long,  till  ole  marster 
beat  'im." 

Thus  malignant,  unrelenting  pride  worked  its  havoc  in  separating 

friends  and  lovers. 


Presently"Mars e Chan "had  to  come  home  to  stay,  because  his  fa- 
ther lost  his  eyesight  one  night  while  saving  his  carriag e-driver 
from  the  flames  of  a burning  bam,  into  which  the  negro  had  been 
sent  to  lead  out  the  entrapped  horses.  "Marse  Chan"  soon  began  to 
assume  his  father's  place  in  the  community,  and,  in  heated  debates 
on  the  war,  whose  possibility  was  beginning  to  be  discussed,  the 
young  man  was  often  called  upon  to  meet  Colonel  Chamberlain  on  the 
oratorical  platform.  Soon  there  was  a definite  rupture  between  the 

1.  "Marse  Chan",  In  Q1 e Virginia,  11-2. 


- 


. 


29 


vehement  old  man  and  the  proud  .youth,  which  ended  in  a duel  in  which 
the  young  man  deliberately  fired  into  the  air,  in  order  not  to  in- 
jure his  opponent's  body.  This  act  only  increased  the  anger  of  the 

Colonel,  and  it  allied  to  her  father  the  sympathies  of  Anne,  who  had 

previously  not  been  a party  to  her  father's  quarrel,  although  she 
and  "Marse  Chan"  had  not  been  meeting. 

Just  then  the  war  came,  and  the  young  man  enlisted  as  a urivate. 
By  the  assistance  of  Sam  and  of  Judy,  Anne's  maid  with  whom  Sam  was 
in  love,  Chan  gained  permission  from  Anne  to  say  good-bye  to  her. 

As  they  parted,  Anne,  actuated  by  what  she  conceived  to  be  her  duty 
to  her  father,  declared  she  did  not  love  him.  So  "Marse  Chan",  ac- 
companied by  his  faithful  servitor,  went  sadly  away  to  fight. 

The  raoid  changes  of  war  soon  made  "Marse  Chan"  a captain,  with 

a Mr.  Ronny,  a former  suitor  of  Anne's,  as  his  lieutenant.  This 
young  man  one  day  uttered  uncivil  and  ungentlemanly  remarks  to  Chan 
about  Anne  and  her  father,  and  Chan  unhesitatingly  knocked  the 
thoughtless  lieutenant  down.  Sam,  seizing  his  opportunity,  at  once 
asked  some  member  of  the  company  to  write  to  Judy  for  him.  The 
young  negress,  likewise  unable  to  read  and  write,  took  the  letter  to 
Anne,  just  as  Sam  expected  her  to  do.  Anne  carried  the  news  on  to 
her  father,  and  he,  finally  conquering  his  pride,  told  her  to  write 
to  her  lover. 

"Marse  Chan"  received  Anne's  letter  just  before  he  went  into  the 
battle  in  which  he  lost  his  life.  Carrying  a flag  he  rode  boldly 
forward,  many  feet  in  front  of  his  men,  on  un  to  the  very  guns  he 
had  been  ordered  to  take,  lying  in  the  shadow  of  one  of  the  cap- 
tured field-pieces  was  his  master's  body,  when  Sam  found  it,  covered 
by  the  folds  of  the  flag. 


. 


. 


. 

. 


. 


* 


30 


With  the  death  of  "Mars e Chan",  the  "ole  marster  an'  missis" 
soon  relaxed  their  little  hold  on  the  life  from  which  pride  and 
strife  and  sickness  had  taken  all  the  joy  and  hapniness.  Anne  stayed 
with  them  until  they  died  a year  later,  and  then  she  went  to  nurse  in 
the  army  hospitals,  from  where,  just  before  Richmond  fell,  she  came 
home  dying  of  a fever. 

"Yo'  nuver  would  ’a1 2  knowd  her  fur  de  same 
old  Miss  Anne";  — Sam's  story  is  nearly  done.  "She  wuz  light  ez  a 
piece  o'  peth,  an'  so  white,  'cep'  her  eyes  an'  her  sorrel  hyar,  an* 
she  kep'  on  gittin'  whiter  an'  weaker.  Judy  she  sut'n'y  did  nuss 
her  faithful.  But  she  nuver  got  no  betterment]  De  fever  an'  Marse 
Chan's  bein'  kilt  hed  done  strain  her,  an'  she  died  jes'  'fo'  de 
folks  wuz  sot  free. 

"So  we  buried  Miss  Anne  right  by  Marse  Chan,  in  a place  whar 
old  missis  hed  tole  us  to  leave,  an'  de^-j^  bofe  on  'em  sleep  side  by 
-side  over  in  de  old  grabe  yud  at  home." 

The  immediate  significance  of  "Marse  Chan”  at  the  time  it  first 
appeared  was  the  fact  that  the  story  is  in  negro  dialect.  Its  later 
value  was  its  contribution  to  the  dialect-story  in  general.  It  had 
been  written  in  1880,  the  same  year  that  the  first  of  the  "tfncle  Re- 
mus" sketches  by  Joel  Chandler  Harris  were  published.  Harris's  book 
proved  very  successful,  and,  within  two  or  three  years,  many  new 
American  writers,  familiar  with  the  South  and  its  language,  were 
producing  an  unprecedented  amount  of  dialect  literature.  Miss  Mary 
M.  Murfree,  writing  under  the  pseudonym  Charles  Robert  Craddock,  told 
stories  of  the  Tennessee  Mountains;  Harris  developed  the  life  of  the 
Georgia  negro;  while  Thomas  Nelson  Page  portrayed  the  life  of  Vir- 
ginia. By  the  end  of  the  decade  the  peculiar  speech  of  Indiana  was 
represented  by  James  Whitcomb  Riley;  the  life  in  the  canebrakes  of 

Arkansas  was  revealed  by  Octave  Thanet;  and  the  Middle  West  was  prov- 

(1) 

ing  interesting  as  the  pen  of  Hamlin  Garland  described  it. 

1.  "Marse  Chan",  In  01 e Virg inia,  37-6. 

2.  Pattee,  F.I..;  American  Literature  Since  1870,  307. 


31 


It  was  not,  however,  merely  because  "Mars©  Chan”  is  written  in 
the  dialect  of  the  Virginia  negro  that  it  proved  successful.  The 
plot  of  the  story  which  this  dialect  clothes  is  one  which  could  be 
told  in  any  language.  The  pride  that  separated  the  Montagues  and  the 
Capulets  was  shattered  by  the  death  of  their  children,  just  as  for- 
tune caused  the  sacrifice  of  "Marse  Chan's”  life  to  reconcile  his 
parents  and  th e Chamberlains.  Mr.  Page's  adaptation  of  this  favorite 
old  plot  is  well  developed.  The  succession  of  scenes  is  so  arranged 
that  the  interest  does  not  drop  for  an  instant  until  the  climax  is 
reached  with  Sam's  sad  return  with  "Marse  Chan's"  body.  ifren  then 
the  story  does  not  lose  its  hold  upon  our  interest,  because  so  inti- 
mately Acquainted  have  we  become  with  the  two  families,  that  we  de- 
sire to  know  what  subsequently  was  their  fortune. 

Mr.  Page  is  never  sparing  of  details  in  his  stories.  So  rich 

has  been  his  own  experience,  and  so  active  is  his  imagination,  that, 

in  developing  a character  or  in  forwarding  a plot,  there  is  always  a 

wealth  of  inf orrnati onal  matter  to  attract  and  to  hold  the  reader's 

attention  and  interest.  Sometimes,  as  in  "The  Burial  of  the  Ouns" 

(1) 

and  in  "Elsket",  he  includes  so  many  details,  each  engrossing  in  it- 
self, but  often  unnecessarily  supporting  another  already  sufficient- 
ly significant,  that  the  progress  of  the  story  is  impeded.  In  "Marse 
Chan",  keenly  conscious  of  the  fact  that  the  negro  Sara  would  not 
philosophize  at  length,  but  v/ould  rather  relate  one  bit  of  action  af- 
ter another,  Mr.  Page  has  caused  his  story  to  run  smoothly  onward , 
liberal  of  detail,  but  not  wasteful. 

There  is  a delicate  succession  of  light  and  shade  throughout  the 
story.  In  the  introduction,  when  old  Sam  is  obliged  to  lower  the 

1.  Volumes  II.  and  IX.  respectively. 


. 

' 

• 

* 

- 

. 

. 


■ 


, 


32 


fence  bars  for  the  dignified  passage  of  Chan's  aged  setter,  there  is 
a certain  humor  in  the  unusualness  of  the  situation  that  is  so  ef- 
fectively colored  by  the  sadness  that  comes  on  realizing  the  tender 
loyalty  of  the  old  negro,  that  the  tone  for  the  whole  story  is  im- 
mediately established.  This  ©notional  coloring  affects  the  peace- 
fulness of  the  opening  scenes,  so  that  the  earlier  episodes  of  quiet 
home-life  blend  naturally  with  those  of  passionate  pride  which  fol- 
low. The  darkness  and  suffering  of  the  end  is  relieved  by  a tiny 
flash  of  humor,  so  delicate  in  its  repression  that  it  is  not  dis- 
cordant. It  comes  just  as  Sam  is  describing  the  battle. 

"Yo'  ain1 

never  hear  thunder!  Fust  thing  I knowed,  de  roan  roll'  head  over 
heels  an'  fling  me  up  'g'inst  de  bank,  like  yo ' chuck  a nubbin  over 
'g'inst  de  foot  o'  de  com  pile.  An'  dat's  what  kep'  me  from  bein' 
kilt,  I 'spects.  Judy  she  say  she  think  'twuz  Providence,  but  I 
think  'twuz  de  bank.  O'  co'se.  Providence, put  de  bank  dyah,  but  how 
come  Providence  nuver  saved  Marse  Chan?”'1' 

"Marse  Chan"  is  finished  in  every  detail  of  its  construction, 
polished  with  a skill  that  its  dialect  helps  to  conceal,  and,  at  the 
same  time,  to  reveal.  From  this  standpoint,  it  is  difficult  to  be- 
lieve that  only  a week  was  necessary  for  the  writing  of  it.  But 
just  here  is,  no  doubt,  to  be  found  the  secret  of  its  perfection. 
Inspiration,  together  with  his  experience  in  the  life  which  the  sto- 
ry portrays,  is  the  answer. 

"It  may  please  those  who  enjoy  particulars  to  know  that  the 

popular  writer  regards  'Unc'  Edinburg's  Drowndin'1,  which  was  first 

to  follow  "Marse  Chan",  as  his  best  picture  of  Virginia  life,"  sug- 

(2) 

gests  one  of  Mr.  Page's  critics.  This  statement  means,  no  doubt, 
that  in  this  story  Mr.  Page  describes  most  clearly  the  relationship 
between  master  and  slave,  where  there  is  not  only  loving  obedience, 

1.  "Marse  Chan",  In  Qle  Virginia . 83-4. 

2.  Harkins,  -S.F.  ;*Ti  tt le  Pilgrimag es  etc. , 210. 


* 


T 


■ 


. 


, ' 

- 

, 


, 


• 

33 


but  al30  loving  responsibility.  In  this  story  the  long  courtship  of 
Charlotte  Braxton  by  ’’Marse  George”,  who  has  been  opposed  by  an  un- 
scrupulous rival,  is  brought  to  a happy  consummation  only  after 
’’Marse  George”  almost  loses  his  life  in  saving  his  body-servant  from 
drowning. 


"Well,  de  river  wuz  jes  natchelly  b'ilin',  — "Unc 1 Edin- 
burgh says  when  relating  the  event,  — "AnT  hit  soun'  like  a mill- 
dam  roarin  by;  an*  when  we  got  dyah  Marse  George  tunned  to  me  an1 
tell  me  he  recKon  I oetter  go  bach.  I ax  him  whar  he  gwine,  an'  he 
say:  Home  . I en  I gwine  wid  you1,  I says.  I wuz  mighty  sheered, 
but  me  an  Marse  George  wuz  boys  tog  err;  an1  he  plunged  right  in  an’ 
I after  him.  D * 

"GordJ  ’ twuz  cold  as  ice;  an’  we  ha&n’  got  in  befo*  bofe  horses 
wuz  wwimmin  for  life.  He  holler  to  me  to  byah  de  myah  head  uo  de 
stream;  an  I did  try,  but  what’s  a nigger  to  dat  water J Hit  iis 

pich  me  up  an^  dash  me  down  like  I ain’  no  mo’n  a chip,  an’  de  fust 

thing  I know  I gwine  down  de  stream  like  a niece  of  bark,  an’  water 

washm  all  over  me.  I knowed  den  I gone,  an’  I hollered  for  Marse 

breorge  for  help.  I head  him  answer  me  not  to  git  skeered,  but  to 
hold  on;  but  de  myah  wuz  lungein’  an*  de  water  wuz  all  over  me  like 
an  den  I washed  off  de  myah  back,  an*  got  drownded. 

, : : f11'  ""  de  next  1 know  I wuz  in  de  bed,  an’  I head 

em  talkin^  bout  wherr  I dead  or  not,  an’  I ain'  know  myself  tel]  I 
taste  de  whiskey  dee  po’ring  down  my  jugular. 

^ An  den  dee  tell  me  oout  how  when  I hollered  Marse  George  tun 
baciv  an  struck  out  lor  me  for  life,  an’  how  j es  as  I went  down  de 
last  time  re  cotch  me  an  helt  on  to  me  tell  we  wash  down  to  whar  de 
oank  curve,  an^  dyah  de  current  wuz  so  rapid  hit  yank  him  off  Revel- 
ler back,  out  lie  helt  on  to  de  reins  tell  de  horse  lunge  so  he  hit 
him  wid  he  foot  an1  breck  he  collar-bone,  an’  den  he  had  to  let  "him 
go.  an.  jes  helt  on  to  me;  an1  jes  den  we  wash  up  again  de  bank  an’ 
cotch  in  a tree,  an  de  mens  got  dyah  quick  as  dee  could,  an’  when 
dee  retched  us  Marse  George  wuz  boldin’  on  to  me,  an’  had  he  arm 
wropped  roun’  a limb,  an ! w e wuz  lodged  in  de  crotch,  an1  bofe  ies 
as  aead  as  a nail  . . .”‘-u  J * 

Meh  lady  , the  ohird  oi  the  "In  Ole  Virginia”  group,  is  a sto- 
ry of  the  days  of  the  Civil  Var  and  the  sorrow-filled  years  that  suc- 
ceeded. Yet  again  the  story  is  told  by  a former  slave.  The  emotion- 
al tone  is  many  degrees  brighter  than  that  in  "Marse  Chan”,  because 
the  ending,  so  far  as  the  central  figures  are  concerned,  is  a happy 

1.  ”Unc  ’ Edinburg  ’ s Drowndin ’ ” , In  Ole  Virginia.  74-5. 


34 


one.  Mr.  Page  must  have  discovered,  when  writing  "Unc ' M inburg 1 s 
Lrowndin* ”,  the  value  of  a dramatic  climax,  for  he  has  so  arranged 
his  incidents,  that  they  rise  to  a height  that  is  artistically  con- 
ceived. Here  pathos  and  dignity  and  love  and  joy  are  concentrated 
in  a dramatic  instant,  whose  like  or  whose  equal  is  scarcely  to  be 
found  in  American  literature. 

"Meh  Lady"  was  a loyal  daughter  of  Virginia.  For  the  Southern 
cause  her  brother,  Marse  Phil,  gave  his  life,  and  "Meh  Lady"  and  her 
mother  sacrificed  health  and  property.  Their  desperate  situation  af- 
ter the  war  hastened  the  death  of  the  "old  mistis",  and  "Meh  Lady" 
v/as  left  with  two  faithful  servants,  old  Billy  and  his  wife  Hannah, 
who  was  "Meh  Lady's"  mammy.  The  most  difficult  task  for  "Meh  Lady" 
was  to  fight  against  her  love  for  a young  Northern  colonel,  a distant 
relative.  Luring  a sharp  engagement  close  to  her  home,  this  young 
officer,  who  had  shortly  before  had  an  opportunity  to  be  of  great 
service  to  "Meh  Lady"  and  her  mother,  was  badly  wounded,  and  was  cap- 
tured. For  several  weeks  he  remained  at  the  plantation  on  parole. 
"Meh  Lady"  felt  that  she  would  be  most  untrue  to  herself,  to  her 
family,  and  to  her  country,  should  she  permit  herself  to  love,  and  to 
be  loved  by.  Colonel  Wilton.  So,  after  her  mother's  death,  she  de- 
voted herself  to  teaching  in  a little  school  for  negro  children,  al- 
though her  health  was  failing  day  by  day.  The  "old  raistis"  had,  how- 
ever, told  Billy  that  he  was  to  get  word  to  Colonel  Wilton  after  she 
was  dead,  and  to  ask  him  to  take  care  of  "Meh  Lady".  Old  Billy  and 
Hannah  were  at  their  wits'  ends.  With  only  one  blind,  old  mule, 

Billy  could  not  get  enough  work  done  on  the  plantation  to  support  the 
three  people.  Just  as  Billy,  at  Hannah's  suggestion,  was  about  to 
sell  the  mule  in  order  to  get  money  to  travel  to  N ew  York  to  tell 


. 


. . 

- 


. 


. 


35 


umimg. 


Colonel  Hilton  of  "Meh  lady's"  circumstances,  the  colonel  suddenly 
arrived  at  the  plantation.  Billy  gave  the  colonel  "old  mistis' s" 
message,  and  the  colonel  declared  his  love  to  "Meh  Lady",  but  it  was 
not  until  the  girl  learned  of  her  mother's  dying  wish  that  she  final- 
ly yielded. 

The  preparations  for  the  wedding,  which  the  colonel  insisted  be 
at  once,  were  necessarily  very  simple.  Twenty-four  hours  spent  in 
procuring  a license  and  in  getting  ready  a bridal  dress  were  all 
that  the  impatient  lover  would  grant.  At  last  they  were  ready. 

"An 1 

all  on  a sudden  Hannah  fling  de  do'  wide  open,  an'  Meh  Lady  walk 

out  I 

"G-ordJ  ef  I didn't  think  ' twuz  a angel. 

"She  3 tan'  dyah  jes'  white  as  snow  fura  her  head  to  way  back 
down  on  de  flo'  behine  her,  an'  her  veil  done  fall  roun'  her  like 
white  mist,  an'  some  roses  in  her  han'.  iif  it  didn'  look  like  de 
sun  come  th'oo  de  chahmber  do'  wid  her,  an'  blaze  all  over  de  styars, 
an'  de  Cun'l  he  look  like  she  bline  him  . . . 

"...  Den  I walk  up  befo'  her,  teck  dem  things  out  meh  pocket, 
(some  diamonds  "ole  mistis"  gave  Billy  in  trust  for  "Meh  lady"),  an' 
de  Cun'l  drap  her  arm  an'  stan'  back,  an'  I put  'em  'roun'  her  thote 
an'  on  her  arms,  an'  gin  her  de  res',  an'  Hannah  put  'em  on  her  ears, 
an'  dee  shine  like  stars,  but  her  face  shine  wus'n  dem.  • . An'  den 
de  Cun'l  gi'  her  he  arm,  an'  dee  went  in  de  parlor,  an'  -Hannah  an' 
me  behine  'em.  An'  dyah,  facin'  Mistis'  picture  an'  Marse  Phil's  . 

. .,  lookin'  down  at  'an  bofe,  dee  wuz  married. 

"An'  when  de  preacher  git  to  dat  part  whar  ax  who  give  dis  wo- 
man to  de  man,  he  sort  o'  wait  an'  he  eye  sort  o'  rove  to  me  dis- 
confused  like  he  ax  me  ef  I know;  an'  I don'  know  huccom  'twu.z,  but 
I think  'bout  Marse  Jeems  an'  Mistis  when  he  ax  me  dat,  an'  Marse 
Phil,  whar  all  dead,  an'  all  de  scufflin'  we  done  been  th'oo,  an' 
how  &e  chile  ain'  got  nobody  to  teck  her  part  now  'sep'  jes'  me;  an' 
now,  when  he  wait  an'  look  at  me  dat  way,  an'  ax  me  dat,  I 'bleeged 
to  speak  up.  I jes'  step  for'ard  an'  say: 

"'Old  "Billy'  . 

"An'  jes'  den  de  3un  crawl  roun'  de, winder  shetter  an'  res’  on 
her  like  it  pourin'  light  all  over  her."'1^ 

The  thcee  other  stories  in  this  group  are  not  so  significant 
i*ieh  Lady",  In  01  e Virginia,  136-8.  ___ 


1 


r 


r 


i 


* 


T 


r 


i 


t 


T 


r 


f 


* 


i 


i 


f 


as  those  preceding.  "Ole  1 Stracted"  is  a pathetic  little  account  of 
the  death  of  an  old  negro  man  who  has  lost  his  mind  after  being  tak- 
en from  his  family  and  sold  to  a plantation  owner  in  the  far  South. 
In  his  old  age  he  wanders  back  to  his  early  home,  where  his  son, 
unaware  of  their  relationship,  takes  care  of  him.  "No  Eaid  Pawn"  is 
a weird  and  gruesome  tale  of  a young  lad  who  soends  a stormy  night 
in  a ruined  mansion,  about  which  strange  legends  are  whispered. 

This  story  is  obviously  an  attempt  at  the  Poesque.  "Polly"  closes 
the  group  charmingly.  It  presents  a picture  of  the  happy,  carefree 
life  of  ante-bellum  days,  centering  so  tenderly  around  the  Christ- 
mas holidays.  None  of  the  three  sketches  approaches  the  first  three 
in  worth. 


Mr.  E.  F.  Harkins  has  summed  up  succinctly  the  qualities  and 
the  merits  of  these  tales  by  saying:  • 


"It  was  said  . . . that  the 

stories  were  like  variations  on  a single  theme,  but  we  are  incT  ined 
to  agree  with  the  critic  who  said:  'For  this  we  feel  no  disposition 
to  quarrel  with  Mr.  Page,  being  eager  to  hear  the  tale  as  often  as 
he  may  find  ways  to  tell  it,  and  grateful  to  him  for  such  beautiful 
and  faithful  pictures  of  a society  now  become  portion  and  parcel  of 
the  irrevocable  past.'  To  Mr.  Page  and  his  equally  delightful  con- 
temporary, Mr.  Joel  Chandler  Harris,  the  reading  public  is  indebted 
for  no/^qiall  number  of  the  most  charming  features  of  American  litera 
ture. " 


1.  Harkins,  E.F.;  Little  Pilgrimages  etc.,  209-10 


37 


V.  TEE  DUE  ADS  1888-1897. 

During  the  decade  following  the  publication  of  "In  Ole  Virginia” 
appeared  more  than  two- thirds  of  all  of  Mr.  Page's  short-stories,  the 
first  of  his  essays,  and  a little  group  of  poems.  The  death  of  his 
first  wife  suddenly  brought  to  an  end  the  little  season  of  gay  con- 
tact with  the  social  world,  which  had  been  attracted  to  him,  first  by 
bis  stories,  and  then  by  himself.  The  great  popularity,  which  came 
so  unexpectedly  to  add  its  pleasures  to  the  happiness  of  his  life 
with  Mrs.  Page,  for  a short  time  carried  him  along  on  a dangerous 
wave  of  excitement,  but  his  bereavement  sobered  him.  From  the  quali- 
ty of  his  later  writings,  it  would  seem  that  something,  whether  it 
was  his  intimate  touch  with  the  great  world,  or  the  shock  from  Mrs. 
Page's  passing  - it  is  difficult  to  say  what  it  was  - took  from  him 
his  creative  genius,  for  none  of  his  subsequent  works  bears  the  stamp 
of  great  originality. 

In  1888  was  published  "Two  little  Confederates".  Although  it 
may  be  regarded  as  a short-story,  it  is  really  only  a succession  of 
reminiscences  of  his  experiences  on  Oakland  Plantation  during  the 
years  of  the  war.  Unless  the  background  of  the  civil  conflict,  with 
its  actual  clash  of  opposing  forces  may  be  considered  a plot,  "Two 
little  Confederates"  is  nothing  more  than  a simple  narrative,  skil- 
fully and  interestingly  told. 

Together  with  Armistead  C.  Gordon,  Mr.  Page  produced  (1888)  a 
little  volume  of  poems  called  "Befo1  de  War".  Six  of  them  were  Mr. 
Page's  contribution:  they  are  written  in  the  negro  dialect  of  "Marse 


, 


. 


. 


« 


38 


Chan”.  ”Unc 1 Gabe's  White  Polks",  which  Scribner*  s had  published  in 
1876,  was  republished  in  the  group.  The  latter  portion  of  it  is 
worth  quoting  here,  because  it  illustrates  aptly  how  familiar  Mr. 

Page  is  with  sacred  writings,  and  how  ably  he  uses  Biblical  allusions, 

”Unc  * Gabe"  has  been  telling  a stranger  of  the  old  times  before 

the  war,  and  has  caused  his  old  master  and  mistress  to  seem  to  live 

again.  His  "young  marster"  he  has  not  seen  for  several  years,  since 

the  young  man  went  away  after  the  old  plantation  was  sold  to  pay  the 

father's  honestly-acquired  debts.  The  old  darky  confidently  awaits 

the  young  man's  return. 

"What  say,  Marster?  Yo*  say,  you  knows  — ? 

He's  young  an'  slender-like  an'  fyah; 

Better-lookin'  'n  yo',  of  co'se! 

Hi ! yo's  he?  TPo'  God!  't  is  him! 

'T  is  de  very  voice  an'  eyes  an'  hyah. 

An'  mouf  an'  smile,  on'y  yo'  ain't  so  slim  — 

I wonder  whah  --  whah  is  de  ole  'ooman? 

Now  let  my  soul 
Bepart  in  peace 
For  i behol' 

By  glory,  Lord  I — I knowed  you,  chile  — 

I knowed  you  soon  's  I see'd  your  face.' 

Whar  has  you  been  dis  blessed  while? 

Yo'  ' s' done  com e back  an'  buy  de  place?* 

Oh,  bless  de  Lord  for  al]  his  grace! 

Be  ravins  shell  hunger,  an'  shell  not  lack,  (1) 

Be  Marster,  de  young  Marster,  is  done  come  back!" 

One  of  the  poems,  "Marse  Phil",  is  very  similar  in  content  to 
"Unc1  Gabe's  White  Polks",  but  has  a much  more  humorous  ending: 

"'A  dollar!'  — thankee,  Marster,  you 
sutney  i3  his  son; 

You  is  his  spitt  an'  image,  I declar'i 
What  sey,  young  Marster?  Yes,  suh:  you  sey, 

'It's  five  — not  one  --'  (2) 

Yo'  favors,  honey,  bofe  yo'  pa  an ' ma!" 

Though  Mr.  Page  had  nothing  nublished  during  the  next  three 


1.  "Unc'  Gabe's  White  Polks",  The  Coast  of  Bohemia,  X.,  295. 

2.  "Marse  Phil",  The  Coast  of  Behomia,  X.,  309. 


I 


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I 


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39 


years,  he  was  not  idle.  He  gave  his  attention  largely  to  his  law 
practice  at  Richmond,  hut  occasionally  he  lectured  before  literary 
alumni  societies.  In  1892,  the  year  after  he  went  to  New  York  to 
join  the  staff  of  Earner1 2  s Monthly,  he  published  the  substance  of 
several  of  these  lectures  in  a volume  of  essays  entitled  "The  Old 
South".  In  the  preface  to  these  essays,  Mr.  Page  states  his  purpose 
in  giving  them  a wider  audience  than  they  had  first  had: 

"The  essays 

are  given  to  the  public  in  the  hope  that  they  may  serve  to  belo  a- 
waken  inquiry  into  the  true  history  of  the  Southern  people  and  may 
aid  in  dispell^^  the  mi  sapor  eh  ensi  on  under  which  the  Old  South  has 
lain  so  long." 

These  essays  are  valuable  contributions  to  the  literature  of 
the  Southern  question.  They  express  sincerely  the  thoughts  of  a man 
who  knows  his  subject  thoroughly.  Since  he  is  a Southerner  himself, 
Mr.  Page  cannot  help  being  prejudiced  in  favor  of  the  South,  but  his 
prejudice  is  of  an  open-minded  sort  that  can  look  at  both  sides  of  a 
question. 

"Do  we  know  the  true  history  of  the  South?"  — he  begins 
one  of  his  e^|^ys.  "I  confess  I do  not,  nor  do  I know  where  it  may 

b e 1 earn  ed . " 

Any  man  who  confesses  what  he  does  not  know,  and  who  backs  up  with 
irrefutable  proof  what  he  does  kno w,  deserves  to  be  listened  to,  and 
to  have  his  suggestions  followed. 

These  essays  would  serve  admirably  for  the  study  of  literary 
style.  Because  they  were  originally  prepared  for  platform  presenta- 
tion, the  style  is  almost  conversational  in  its  simplicity.  While 
some  of  the  essays  repeat  ideas  or  facts  given  in  others,  each  se- 
parate essay  deals  with  its  subject  in  a straight-forward  manner  that 

1.  Preface  to  The  Old  South . XII. 

2.  The  Old  South,  XII.,  345. 


40 


shows  that  Mr.  Page  gave  unusual  attention  to  the  structural  develop- 
ment of  these  wri tings. 

Wo  doubt  it  was  of  the  essays  that  Mr.  H.  A.  Toulmin  was  think- 
ing particularly  when  he  called  Thomas  Nelson  Pas e a Social  Histori- 

(I) 

an.  This  is  an  excellent  epithet,  because  it  suggests  Mr.  Page's 
life  purpose  very  exactly.  given  in  his  dialect  stories,  which  super- 
ficially seem  intended  but  to  interest  and  to  entertain,  he  is  tell- 
ing the  history  of  a peculiar  society.  He  misht  also  be  called  an 
interpreter  in  words  of  one  syllable.  Some  readers  or  critics  misht 
take  exception  to  Mr.  Page's  writings  because  he  employs  such  simple 
language,  but  it  must  be  remembered  that  he  is  the  personificati on  of 
quiet  dignity.  For  him  to  attract  attention  to  himself  by  using  long 
or  unusual  words  would  be  inconsistent  with  his  conception  of  correct 
deportment  and  of  his  mission.  To  convey  his  message  in  a form  that 
could  most  easily  be  understood  has  been  Mr.  Page's  aim.  How  would 
it  have  helped  the  cause  of  the  misunderstood  South  to  have  its  tra- 
gic story  buried  beneath  an  overwhelming  mass  of  weighty  rhetoric? 

The  appearance  of  "The  Old  South"  indicated  that  Mr.  Page  had 
at  least  one  other  literary  interest  than  the  short-story.  There  had 
already  been  a hint  of  still  another  interest  a year  previous  when 
"On  Newfound  River"  was  published.  ibren  in  its  first  edition  it  was 
too  long  to  be  termed  a short-story,  and  too  unpretentious  to  be  con- 
sidered a novel.  In  the  preface  to  the  1908  edition,  where  the  story 
is  somewhat  enlarged  over  the  original,  the  author,  unable  to  classi- 
fy it,  says: 

"The  reader  will,  perhaps,  bear  in  mind  that  'On  Newfound 
River'  does  not  pretend  to  be  a Novel;  but  is  on  its  face  a 'Story'; 
— a love-Story  if  you  will  --  of  simple  Country  life  in  Old  Virgi- 
nia."' 21 

1.  Toulmin,  Harry  A.,  Jr.  Social  Historians. 

2.  On  N ew found  Hiver , III.  ii. 


. 


. 


. 

t 


. 


. 

. 


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41 


No  doubt  some  precisians  would  desire  to  call  it  a novelette,  but, 
considering  the  accustomed  simplicity  of  its  author  and  its  own  un- 
assertiveness, "story”  is  as  technical  as  is  necessary. 

"On  Newfound  River"  is  not  a dialect  story,  but  it  deals  with 
the  members  of  the  same  Southern  aristocracy  that  moves  with  digni- 
ty across  the  pages  of  "Marse  Chan"  and  of  "Meh  Lady".  So  simple, 
so  unpretentious,  so  unobtrusive  is  the  style  that  the  reader  on 
finishing  the  book  might  be  led  to  think  it  would  be  easy  to  repro- 


duce. But  he  would  doubtless  find  himself  quite  unable  to  record 
his  own  thoughts  so  smoothly  and  so  plainly,  were  he  to  try.  A 


paragraph  or  two  from  the  story  will  suggest  the  style  better  than 
could  any  discussion. 

The  first  tells  of  the  meeting  of  young  Bruce  landon  with  Mar- 
garet Browne. 

"Bruce,  laying  his  gun  down,  stooped  and  drank  at  the 
spring,  and  then  flung  himself  on  the  ground  at  the  foot  of  the  pop- 
lar; and  fixing  his  head  comfortably,  gazed  up  at  the  blue  summer 
sky.  He  heard  the  faint  clatter  of  the  cowbelDs  below  him,  softened 
by  the  distance  to  a low,  mellow,  and  irregular  tinkle.  He  heard 
the  water  purling  over  some  pebbles  close  by;  he  heard  a wood  wren's 
bright  note  in  a tree  above;  he  heard  the  faint  call  of  his  father's 
ploughmen  across  the  pond  to  their  teams,  and  then  — he  felt  a hand 
or  something  on  his  face,  and  then  --  some  one  kissed  him;  and, 
opening  his  eyes,  he  found  himself  looking  into  the  wide-open,  and 
somewhat  startled  big  brown  eyes  of  a little  girl  who  was  kneeling 
beside  him,  bending  over  him  with  a look  of  mingled  wonderment  and 
pleasure.  Her  cheeks  were  as  pink  as  roses,  and  her  curling  hair 
was  hanging  in  tangles  on  either  side  of  her  throat,  leaving  her 
oval  face  like  a picture  set  in  a frame  of  loosely  twisted  dull  red 


It  is  characteristic  of  Mr.  Page  that  he  very  seldom  gives  mi- 
nute descriptions.  He  supplies  a few  details,  often  of  the  most 
general  nature,  like  the  "oink  as  roses"  and  "hanging  in  tangles" 
ju3 1 quoted,  and  then  he  develops  the  character  through  action.  But 


the  personage  i3  no  less  real  for  lack  of  physical  portrayal.  Mr. 
1.  On  N ewf ound  River , III.,  38-9. 


, 


■ 


. 

. 


. 


. 


. 


, 


42 

Page  uses  descriptive  phrases  that  possess  a wealth  of  connotation, 
and  the  reader  may  supply  what  details  he  pleases. 

The  closing  paragraphs  of  "On  Newfound  River”  are  excellently 
written.  They  seem  like  the  finale  of  some  grand  symphony  that,  af- 
ter carrying  the  emotions  to  some  far  height  of  feeling,  sinks  gent- 
ly hack,  so  that  there  will  be  no  sudden  shock  when  again  the  world 
of  things  orosaic  is  reached. 

"The  fields  were  quiet  now;  but  the  rich  voices  of  laughing  ne- 
groes floated  up  from  the  oaths  by  which  they  wended  their  way  home; 
the  mellow  dangle  of  cow-bells  sounded  in  the  distance,  accompanied 
by  the  lowing  of  the  cows  as  they  came  slowly  up  to  their  calves 
from  the  pasture  by  the  pond;  and  a single  partridge,  on  a stump  a 
hundred  yards  away  in  the  field,  piped  his  three  notes  of  peace  to 
his  vagrant  mate  . . . 

"A  homing  dove  passed  close  above  . . . on  the  way  to  its  nest, 
a mocking-bird  sang  a brief  good-night  stave  of  happiness  and  N pyrj 
found  settled  down  beneath  the  peaceful  stars  in  deep  content.” 

The  year  1891  was  marked  by  yet  another  aspect  of  the  widening 
of  Mr.  Page’s  literary  interests,  for  in  this  year  was  published 
"Among  the  Camps",  a little  group  of  stories  for  children.  "Kitty- 
kin,  and  the  Part  She  Played  in  the  War”  is  based,  without  a doubt, 
on  some  experience  of  hi 3 own  in  the  war  days  when  there  was  fight- 
ing on  his  own  plantation.  "Mancy  Pansy",  a story  of  Reconstruction 

days,  has  some  points  in  common  with  the  incidents  related  in  "Red 

(2) 

Rock"  of  lieutenant  Thurston  and  the  Docketts.  "Jack  and  Jake”  is 
yet  another  little  story  developed  from  a recollection  of  his  own 
childhood.  "A  Captured  Santa  Claus",  not  published  until  1902,  is 
now  included  in  this  group. 

In  the  same  year  that  "Among  the  Camps"  came  from  the  press, 
appeared  "KLsket  and  Other  Stories".  It  is  hard  to  imagine  how  Mr. 

1.  On  IT ewf ound  River.  III.,  285-6. 

2.  Red  Rock,  IV.,  Chapter  VI. 


. 


. 


! ..  : 

, 


. 


. 


, • 


43 


Page  came  to  write  "Elsket"  and  "A  Soldier  of  the  Snpire",  for  no 

authority  is  to  be  found  for  saying  that  Mr.  Page  was  in  Europe 

previously  to  writing  them.  These  two  short-stories  and  two  “brief 

(1) 

Ihglish  episodes  in  "Gordon  Keith"  contain,  in  fact,  the  only  non- 
American  scenes  in  Mr.  Page's  serious  fiction.  "The  Soldier  of  the 
Empire"  is  not  so  definitely  localised  that  a foreigner,  possessing 
some  knowledge  of  actual  warfare  and  a vivid  imagination  could  not 
conceive  the  story.  Its  style  suggests  "The  last  Glass"  by  Alphonse 
Paudet,  perhaps  because  of  their  mutual  reference  to  the  Franco- 
Prussian  War.  "Sl3ket",  however,  with  its  Norwegian  background,  is 
a little  mystery,  explainable  only  through  Mr.  Page's  constructive 
imagination.  Two  of  the  stories  in  this  collection  are  again  in  ne- 
gro dialect,  but  they  do  not  compare  in  the  slightest  degree  with 
his  earlier  successes.  "George  Washington's  last  Duel"  tells  the 
3tory  of  a Southern  landowner  and  his  drunken  butler.  It  is  a some- 
what strained  attempt  to  write  a humorous  story,  based  on  the  duel-  a 
ling  code.  In  "P'laski's  Tunament"  an  old  colored  man  recounts  the 
misdeeds  of  his  worthless  son.  Were  it  not  for  the  dialect,  the  mere 
narration  of  the  series  of  incidents  would  fall  quite  flat.  "Fun  to  \ 
Seed",  the  remaining  story,  is  particularly  valuable,  since  it  re- 
veals a characteristic  of  style  that  Mr.  Page  later  developed  very 
ably.  Although  the  story  is  almost  unnecessarily  pathetic,  and  al- 
though  it  contains  a deal  of  sentiment  that  is  somewhat  trying,  it 
has  touches  of  sarcasm  and  satire  that  redeem  it.  The  story  tells  of 
a young  man,  Jim  Upton,  the  last  male  of  a family  once  influential , 
but  now  ruined  by  the  war.  Every  one  in  the  community  has  the  idea 
that  the  Upton  family  has  "run  to  seed",  and  that,  therefore,  there 

1.  Gordon  Keith,  VI.,  Chapters  II.  and  XXIV. 


, 

t 

■ 


. 


. 


* 


* 


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44 


i3  no  need  of  trying  to  help  them.  Jim  straggles  with  all  his  im- 
mature strength  to  provide  for  his  mother  and  sister.  He  obtains  a 
man* s job  on  a railroad,  and  then  has  to  suffer  much  abuse  from  the 
evil-minded  engineer  under  whom  he  works.  At  the  end  of  the  narra- 
tive Jim  saves  a train-load  of  people  from  death  during  a wash-out, 
but  he  loses  hi3  own  life.  It  is  the  engineer  himself  who  3ays, 

’’And  when  one  of  them  old  director-fellers,  who  had  been  swilling 
himself'  around  behind  there  cone  aroun ' , with  his  kid  gloves  on  and 
hi3  hands  in  his  great-coat  pockets,  lookin’  down,  and  sayin'  some- 
thing about,  'Poor  fellow,  couldn't  he  'a  jumped?  Why  didn't  he 
jump?'  I let  him  have  it;  I said;  'Yes,  and  if  it  hadn't  been  for 
him,  you  and  I'd  both  been  frizzin'  in  h--l  thi3  minute.'  And  the 
President  standin'  there  said  to  some  of  them,  'That  was  the  same 
young  fellow  who  cane  into  my  office  to  get  a place  last  year  when 
you  were  down,  and  said  he  had  "TV'$  to  seed".  But',  he  says,  "Gen- 
tlemen, it  was  d--d  good  seed!"’ 

Mr.  Page's  satire  is  directed  at  those  v/ell-to-do  people,  would- 

be  aristocrats,  who  patronizingly  look  down  upon  the  poor.  Mrs. 

Wagoner,  the  wife  of  a railroad  official,  is  the  particular  object  oi 

his  scorn  in  this  story,  and  with  short,  abrupt  phrases  and  sentences 

that  dart  and  out  like  tiny  daggers,  her  character  is  revealed. 

"Mrs.  Wagoner  used  to  go  to  see  Mrs.  Upton  --  she  went  frequently. 

It  was  'her  duty'  she  said.  She  carried  her  things  --  especially  ad- 
vice. There  are  people  whose  visits  are  like  spells  of  illness.  It 
took  Mrs.  Upton  a fortnigiit  to  get  over  one  of  these  visits  --  to 
convalesce.  Mrs.  Wagoner  was  a 'mother  to  her';  at  least,  Mrs.  Wa- 
goner herself  said  so.  In  some  respects  it  was  rather  akin  to  the 
substance  of  that  name  that  form3  in  vinegar.  It  wa3  hard  to  swal- 
low: it  galled.  -tdven  Mrs.  Upton's  gentleness  was  overtaxed  --  and 
reb elled." ' 

With  all  the  artistic  cunning  of  Defoe  in  "The  Shortest  Way  witl 
Dissenters",  Mr.  Page  apparently  sides  with  the  very  people  he  is 
attacking,  by  seeming  to  laugh  at  the  Uptons. 

"Jim  was  one  day  sent 

for  (by  the  President  of  the  railroad),  and  was  asked  about  his 
eyes.  They  were  bad.  There  was  no  doubt  about  it.  They  were  in- 
flamed; he  could  not  see  a hundred  yard3.  He  did  not  tell  about  the 

1.  "Hun  to  Seed",  The  Burial  of  the  Guns,  II.,  167. 

2.  I oid . , 141 . 


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extra  trips  and  putting  tobacco  in  them  (to  keep  him  awake).  • • 

They  said  he  must  go.  Jim  turned  white.  He  went  to  his  little  room 
close  up  under  the  roof  of  a little  dingy  house  in  a back  street, 
and  sat  down  in  the  dark;  thought  about  his  mother  and  Kitty,  and 
dimly  about  some  one  else;  wrote  his  mother  and  Kitty  a letter;  said 
he  was  coming  home  — called  it  'a  visit';  cried  over  the  letter, 
but  wasscareful  not  to  cry  on  it.  Ee  was  a real  cry-baby  --  Jim 
was."'1' 

After  "On  Newfound  River",  "The  Old  Smith" , and  " Elsket"  ap- 
peared, a decided  change  in  the  quality  of  Mr.  Page's  literary  nro- 
duction  can  be  discerned.  If  a graph  were  to  be  made  of  Mr.  Page's 
literary  career,  the  point  of  greatest  excellence  would  be  found  at 
the  very  beginning.  The  descent  of  the  curve  would  be  so  gradual 
at  first  that  it  would  seem  of  no  signif icance,  but  it  would  be 
found  that,  from  1894  onward,  there  would  be  a rapid  general  de- 
cline, with  an  occasional  rise,  marking,  perhaps,  one  of  the  novels. 
The  first  serious  evidence  of  the  loss  of  former  literary  power  is 
to  be  noted  in  "The  Burial  of  the  Guns"  (1894). 

The  great  defect  in  this  short-story  is  its  poorly-balanc ed 
construe tion.  The  story  covers  about  forty  pages.  The  first  fif- 
teen contain  a resume7  of  the  Civil  War.  The  next  twenty  laboriously 
trace  the  events  of  the  few  days  during  which  the  artillery  battery 
stayed  on  the  mountain.  The  last  five  pages  tell  the  real  story  of 
the  burial  of  the  field-nieces  by  throwing  them  over  a declivity  in- 
to a river.  It  would  be  unfair  to  say  that  the  first  part  of  the 
story  is  wasted,  because  accounts  of  the  Civil  War  will  be  treasured 
as  long  as  the  United  States  lasts.  Moreover,  it  would  be  imnossibl 
to  find  anywhere  else  this  huge  subject  treated  so  effectively  in  so 

little  space.  But,  so  far  as  the  plot  of  "The  Burial  of  the  Guns" 
is  concerned,  Mr.  Page  should  have  incorporated  in  what  is  now  the 
second  section,  such  details  of  the  first  as  are  necessary  to  the 

1. "Run  to  Seed".  The  Burial  of  the  Guns.  II..  161. 


. 


' 1 

. 

T 

. 

- 

. 


. 


46 


denouement.  The  second  portion  of  the  story,  as  it  stands,  moves  too 
slowly.  There  is  a wealth  of  detail  of  fact,  plenty  of  action,  but 
there  is  not  enough  conversation,  although  the  episodes  of  the  mes- 
senger and  of  the  colonel's  speech  could  be  enlivened  by  giving  the 
actual  words  spoken*  The  end  of  the  story  is  told  with  a masterly 
repression  that  reveals  far  more  than  it  definitely  says.  As  the 
tale  is  now  told,  it  seems  more  like  a sketch  for  a novel,  than  like 
a finished  short-story.  But,  faulty  as  is  "The  Burial  of  the  Guns", 
it  can  be  read  time  and  again  with  pleasure  because  of  the  fund  of 
information  it  contains.  Sverv  detail  is  interesting  in  itself,  even 
though  each  one  does  not  further  the  plot.  Mr.  Page  is  so  completely 
informed  on  the  subject  of  the  South  that  he  is  at  times  carried  a- 
way  by  the  flood  of  his  knowledge. 

In  the  same  volume  with  "The  Burial  of  the  Guns"  appeared  "Lit- 
tle Darby",  an  expansion  of  the  incident  of  the  letter  found  on  the 
dead  soldier,  which  was  the  inspiration  for  "Marse  Chan".  Mr.  Page 
tells  his  story  well,  showing  that  pride  may  be  found  in  the  homes  of 
the  poor  as  well  a3  of  the  rich.  Again,  however,  he  tells  too  much. 
In  ninety  pages  he  gives  a whole  life  history,  enough  for  a novel, 
and  at  the  climax,  when  Vashti  is  trying  to  destroy  the  bridge  to 
prevent  pursuit  of  Darby,  every  act  is  so  minutely  recorded,  that  the 
movement  of  the  story  is  slackened. 

"My  Cousin  Fanny",  in  the  same  volume,  is  Mr.  Page's  second  suc- 
cessful use  of  satire,  this  time  in  a personal  essay  of  the  Charles 
I Iamb  type. 

"My  cousin  Fanny  was  an  old  maid;  indeed,  to  follow  St. 
Paul's  turn  of  phrase,  she  was  an  old  maid  of  the  old.  maids.  No  one 
who  saw  her  a moment  could  have  doubted  it.  Old  maids  have  from  mo3t 
people  a feeling  rather  akin  to  pity  --  a hard  heritage.  They  very 
often  have  this  feeling  from  the  young.  This  must  oe  the  hardest 


47 

part  of  all  --  to  see  around  them  friends,  each  'a  happy  mother  of 
children* , little  ones  responding  to  affection  with  the  sweet  ca- 
resses of  childhood,  while  any  advances  that  they,  their  aunts  or 
cousins,  may  make  are  met  with  indifference  or  condescension.  My 
cousin  Fanny  was  no  e^eption. " ' ^ 

Without  any  more  complicated  theme  than  the  series  of  ups  and 
downs  in  any  normal  life,  Mr.  Page  develops  the  character  of  this 
old  maid,  telling  of  many  of  her  good  deeds,  but,  in  doing  so,  call- 
ing attention  to  her  little  foibles,  her  little  contrarities,  her 
little  peculiarities,  apparently  astonished  that  so  odd  a person 
could  be  of  service  to  any  one. 

"She  had  a peculiarly  sentimental 
temperament.  As  1 look  back  at  it  all  now,  she  was  much  given  to 
dwelling  upon  old-time  poems  and  romances,  which  we  thought  very 
ridiculous  in  any  one,  especially  in  a spinster  of  forty  odd.  She 
would  stop  and  talk  about  the  branch  of  a tree  with  the  leaves  all 
turning  red  or  yellow  or  purple  in  the  common  way  in  which,  as 
everyone  knows,  leaves  always  turn  in  the  fall;  or  even  about  a 
tangle  of  briers,  scarlet  with  frost,  keeping  us  waiting  while  she 
fooled  around  a brier  patch,  . . . ; worrying  us  by  telling  uver  a- 
gain  just  how  the  boughs  and  leaves  looked  massed  against  the  old 
gray  fence,  which  she  could  do  till  you  could  see  them  precisely  as 
they  were.  She  was  very  aggravating  in  this  way.  Sometimes  she 
would  even  take  a pencil  or  pen  and  a sheet  of  paper  for  old  Slinky 
(one  of  her  young  relatives),  and  reproduce  it.  She  could  not  draw, 
of  course,  for  she  was  not  a painter;  allvshe  could  do  was  to  make 
anything  look  almost  just  like  it  was." 

The  satiric  vein  is  carried  out  to  the  end  of  the  essay,  where 
the  effect  of  "Cousin  Fanny's"  life  upon  her  mocking  young  relatives 
and  friends  is  lightly  sketched,  as  though  the  author  had  no  com- 
prehension of  the  import  of  his  words. 

"I  really  miss  her  a great 
deal.  The  other  boys  say  they  do  the  same.  I suppose  it  is  the 
trouble  she  used  to  give  us. 

"The  old  set  are  all  doing  well.  . . Old  Blinky  is  in  Paris. 

He  had  a picture  in  the  salon  last  year,  an  autumn  landscape,  called 
*le  Cote"  du  Bois1 2 3.  I believe  the  translation  of  that  is  'The  ’Vood- 
side'.  His  coloring  is  said  ipkoe  nature  itself.  To  think  of  old 
Blinky  being  a great  artist!"' 

1.  "My  Cousin  Fanny",  Tb  e 3u  ri al  of  the  duns , II.,  171. 

2.  Ibid. . 187-8. 

3.  Ibid. , 208. 


48 


A little  volume  of  sketches,  called  ’’Pastime  Stories”,  came 
from  the  press  in  1894.  Most  of  these  stories  are  amusing  anecdotes 
slight  incidents,  brief  narratives,  which  Mr.  Page  had  either  wit- 
nessed, or  of  which  he  had  learned  during  his  early  days  at  the  law. 
Some  of  them  are  well-written;  others  lack  finish,  for  often  the 
style  is  amateurish,  or  the  endings  are  lame.  These  faults  are  no 
doubt  due  to  the  fact  that  the  stories  are  true,  and  thus  run  con- 
trary to  the  artistic  technique  of  fiction.  The  preface  to  the 
volume  presents  Mr.  Page’s  defence: 

”1  will  simply  say  that  no  one 

can  be  as  sensible  of  the  demerits  of  these  stories  as  I am  myself. 
So,  my  'gentle  reader',  we  agree  on  that  point  at  least.  If  you 
ask  me  why,  then,  I wrote  them,  I will  say  truthfully,  because  I 
was  asked  and  chose  to  do  so.  Then,  why  did  I uublish  them?  Be- 
cause I found  a publisher. 

’’There  are  some  good  stories  in  the  lot,  old  stories  which  have 
survived  for  generations  --  one,  I am  satisfied,  for  at  least  a cen- 
tury --  and  if  they  do, not  read  well,  it  is  because  I have  marred 
them  in  the  telling."  ' 

The  second  period  of  Mr.  Page's  literary  career  was  brought  to 
a close  in  1897  by  the  publication  of  "The  Old  Gentleman  of  the 
Black  Stock”,  another  ’’story”,  his  own  name  for  a long  short-story, 
and  by  the  appearance  of  another  essay,  "Social  life  in  Old  Vir- 
ginia" • 

The  ten  years  of  this  period  brought  many  changes  to  Mr.  Page's 
life.  The  sudden  death  of  his  first  wife  nipped,  like  a frost,  the 
budding  tip  of  his  genius,  which  had  been  growing  straight  upwards 
to  the  light  of  fame.  Then,  for  a time,  there  was  arrested  growth; 
and  afterwards  there  came  new  branches  at  the  sides,  that  promised 
to  grow  sturdily,  while  the  old  shoot  dwindled. 


1.  Pastime  Stories,  X.,  xi.  and  xii 


49 


YI.  TEE  HOVELS. 

During  the  seemingly  idle  years  between  1894,  when  "The  Burial 
of  the  Guns"  appeared,  and  1897,  when  "The  Old  Gentleman  of  the 
Black  Stock"  was  published,  Mr.  Page  was  very  often  busy  writing  and 
re-writing  his  first  novel,  "Red  Rock",  which  came  from  the  press  in 
1898.  A visitor  to  Mr.  Page's  Washington  home  has  said,  concerning 
this  long  task: 

"Those  who  imagine  that  because  an  author's  style  is 
easy  and  flowing  the  amount  of  labor  put  upon  his  works  has  there- 
fore been  small  should  see  the  numerous  bundles  of  manuscript  in 
Mr.  Page's  study  marked  variously  --  Original  Draft  of  Red  Rock, 
Discarded  Manuscript  of  Red  Rock,  Red  Rock  Rewritten,  etc.  This 
story,  which  ran  through  Scribn er ' s Mag a z in e.  had,  it  seems,  been  a 
long  time  in  the  making,  about  three  years,  including  idle  months. 
After  v/riting  the  first  cast,  he  came  to  the  conclusion  that  poli- 
tics had  been  allowed  to  play  too  prominent  a part,  and  to  rectify 
this  fault  the  entire  book  was  rewritten  in  shorter  form.  Ho  a-  /^) 
mount  of  pains  is  spared  by  him  to  bring  his  work  to  perfection." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  be  able  to  look  at  one  or  two  of  the 

rough  drafts  of  this  novel,  to  see  what  incidents  or  characters  Mr. 

Page  introduced  into,  or  eliminated  from,  each  one,  and  to  discover 

what  fresh  aspects  of  his  newly  undertaken  art  he  incorporated  as  he 

re-wrote  the  story. 

It  is  evident,  of  course,  that  Mr.  Page  had  had,  for  a long 
time  previous  to  1898,  a desire  to  produce  a novel,  and  had  tested 
his  powers  and  the  opinion  of  the  public  by  his  two  "stories",  "On 
Newfound  River"  and  "The  Old  Gentleman  of  the  Black  Stock".  But, 
even  this  long  preparation  of  nearly  ten  years  did  not  give  him  the 
facility  he  sought.  His  best  genius  focussed  itself  upon  concen- 
trated, dramatic  effects.  When  it  sought  to  shine  over  a large 


1.  Halwey,  E.W. ; American  Authors  and  Th eir  Homes , 180-1 


. 


. 


. 

. 

. ■ 


. 


. 

. 

. 


. 


50 


space,  it  broke  up  into  little  spots  of  color,  as  a ray  of  light, 
dispersed  through  the  facets  of  a prism,  falls  in  tiny  rainbows  on 
the  floor.  Throughout  '’Red  Rock"  there  is  apparent  the  effect  of 
Mr.  Page's  command  of  the  short-story:  there  is  too  strong  a ten- 
dency to  resolve  the  whole  novel  into  distinct  episodes,  between 
which  there  is  not  always  the  coherence  which  the  accepted  laws  of 
the  novel  demand. 

"Red  Rock"  the  plantation  belonging  to  the  Gray  family,  takes 
its  name  from  a huge  rock  in  the  grove  behind  the  gardens*  Tradi- 
tion maintains  that  the  reddish  stain  upon  the  boulder  is  from  the 
blood  of  an  Indian  chief  who  killed  the  wife  of  the  first  of  the 
Grays  to  live  in  America.  In  the  house,  hanging  over  the  mantle 
in  the  living-room,  is  this  same  Mr.  Gray's  picture,  which  has  a 
mysterious  habit  of  falling  whenever  some  evil  is  imminent.  The 
heir  to  "Red  Rock"  is  Jacqueline  Gray, whose  father  is  killed  in  the 
Civil  War,  and  who  himself  returns  too  incapacitat ed  by  wounds  to 
take  an  active  part  in  the  disastrous  days  of  Reconstruction. 

Hiram  Still,  formerly  the  Grays'  overseer,  ably  assisted  by  his 
son.  Wash,  illegally  obtains  possession  of  "Red  Rock",  and  attempts 
to  establish  his  family  in  all  the  dignity  which  formerly  reigned  in 
the  mansion.  The  Stills,  also,  secretly  abet  the  machinations  of 
Jonada'o  Leech,  an  unprincipled  "carpetbagger",  who  comes  to  be  Pro- 
vost of  the  county  and  to  establish  the  "Freedmen's  Bureau".  Osten- 
sibly Leech  is  to  represent  the  Federal  Government  in  aiding  the  ne- 
groes to  profit  from  their  newly-rec eived  freedom,  but  he  really 
uses  his  office  to  further  his  contemptible  political  ambitions. 

When  someone  is  needed  to  lead  the  inevitable  rebellion  against 
Leech's  tyranny,  Steve  Allen,  a cousin  of  Jacqueline's,  assumes  for 


. 


f 

, 

f 

. 


. 


. 

, 


* 1 , , ' 


51 


a time  command  of  a little  band  of  "Ku  Klux".  This  interference  in- 
furiates the  cowardly  Leech  and  his  associates,  and  they  make  Steve 
the  especial  object  of  their  wrath. 

Major  Welch,  a wealthy  Northerner,  comes  with  his  wife  and 
daughter,  Euth,  to  the  South  to  look  after  property  which  he  has  re- 
cently purchased  in  the  "Bed  Bock"  neighborhood.  The  Welches  are 
drawn  into  local  politics,  because  Mr.  Still  helps  the  Major  with 
his  real  estate  deals,  while  Buth  is  attracted  to  Steve  Allen. 

Hiram  Still* s title  to  "Bed  Bock"  is  not  entirely  clear,  and  he 
appeals  to  Leech  for  aid  in  the  suit  which  Jacqueline  brings  against 
him.  Thus  the  struggle  to  regain  the  plantation  soon  assumes  far 
more  than  private  significance.  The  two  reprobates  direct  their 
attack  upon  Steve,  whom  they  fear  most.  The  young  man  becomes  a 
law-breaker  when  he  and  his  friends  take  Jacqueline's  brother  out  of 
jail  by  force,  after  Leech  has  had  the  boy  locked  up  on  a charge  of 
murder.  Steve  finally,  however,  surrenders  himself  to  Leech  in  or- 
der to  save  his  friends,  whom  the  Provost  has  imprisoned  and  intends 
to  deport.  In  the  meantime  the  "Bed  Bock"  case  has  so  shaped  itself 
that,  were  Steve  to  regain  complete  liberty,  all  of  the  nower  of 
Leech  and  his  cronies  would  vanish.  Leech  finds  out  that  Steve  has 
told  Buth  Welch  of  his  connection  with  the  "Ku  Elux",  and  he  desires 
the  girl  as  a witness  against  Steve.  His  wishes  are  discovered  in 
time  for  Buth  to  be  advised  to  ask  Steve  to  marry  her  and  thus  to 
invalidate  any  testimony  she  might  give.  Without  her  as  a witness. 
Leech  has  no  case;  and  then,  a little  later,  before  the  "Bed  Bock" 
matter  again  comes  up  in  court,  Jacqueline  and  Still  come  to  an 
agreement  • 

Mr.  Page  has  not  been  entirely  successful  in  constructing  the 


, 


. 

. 


. 

, 

. 


, 

> 

* 

, 


plot  of  this  novel.  As  the  action  develops  the  author’s  emphasis 
■upon  certain  of  the  characters  shifts,  bringing  some  into  prominence 
who  at  first  suggest  no  future  value,  and  discarding  others  who  are 
initially  significant,  fn  the  opening  chapters  the  hero  seems  to  be 
Jacqueline  Gray,  but  the  wounds  he  receives  in  the  war  and  his  sub- 
sequent ill-health  prevent  him  from  taking  a very  active  part  in  the 
story.  Very  soon,  indeed,  he  goes  to  Ihrooe  for  some  time,  leaving 
the  role  of  hero  to  Steve  Allen,  whos e participation  in  local  poli- 
tics and  his  legal  battles  to  regain  Jacqueline's  property  make  him 
the  real  central  figure  of  the  plot.  Although  in  the  end  Mr.  Page 
allows  Jacqueline  to  marry  Blair  Gary,  the  girl  with  whom  he  is  in 
love  at  the  beginning  of  the  book,  the  situation  is  a trifle  forced, 
because  Steve  must  then  marry  Ruth  Welch,  who  does  not  appear  in  the 
first  half  of  the  novel.  Thus  Mr.  Page  violates  established  litera- 
ry custom  in  allowing  the  male  character  upon  whom  so  much  emphasis 
is  placed  at  first,  to  take  a secondary  place  later  on,  while  the 
real  protagonist  is  joined  to  a minor  female  character. 

Certain  other  characters  and  themes  are  not  developed  to  their 
limits.  For  instance,  there  is  a certain  Captain  Me Raffle  who 
stalks  dark  and  saturnine  of  face  through  a chanter  or  two,  giving 
the  impression  that,  at  the  proper  time,  he  will  wreck  great  dis- 
tinction on  all  who  are  near  him,  and  then  - he  fades  out  oi  the 
picture.  The  most  notable  example,  however,  of  Mr.  Page's  failure 
to  seize  all  his  opportunities  is  in  his  development  of  the  "Red 
Rock"  legend.  The  suggestion  of  the  supernatural  in  the  appearance 
of  the  ghostly  rider  and  in  the  strange  behavior  of  the  rider's 
portrait,  and  its  possible  effects  upon  the  credulity  of  the  igno- 
rant grasping  old  villain,  Mr.  Still,  are  given  much  prominence  in 


. 


, 


. 


■ 

. 

. 


. 


■ 


* 


. 


' 

53 

the  opening  chapters  of  the  novel,  but  the  author  loses  sight  of 
these  anticipatory  hints  after  a time,  as  though  unable  to  sustain 
a minor  theme  throughout  the  novel. 

The  habit  of  writing  intensively,  of  selecting  his  scenes  to 
produce  a single  effect,  is  so  strong  in  Mr.  Page  that,  when  he  de- 
sires to  write  extensively,  he  cannot  be  entirely  successful.  The 
separate  events  are  well  told;  they  are  clear  and  direct.  In  loos- 
ening his  tension,  however,  Mr.  Page’s  subject  has  spread  so  far 
that  the  beginning,  the  middle,  and  the  end  of  ’’Red  Rock”  have  not 
the  unity  that  a skilful  novelist  would  have  given  to  the  plot. 

While  it  is  quite  true  that  the  plot  of  ’’Red  Rock”  can  be  cri- 
ticized from  the  standpoint  of  unity,  yet,  in  many  other  respects, 
it  observes  the  rules.  After  the  first  chapter,  containing  the  set- 
ting and  introducing  the  Southern  characters,  there  comes  a chapter 
presenting  an  antebellum  wedding  celebration,  whose  atmosphere  of 
gayety  and  wealth  contrasts  sharply  with  the  sorrow  and  poverty  a 
little  later.  Just  at  this  moment  arrive  visitors  from  the  North, 
thus  making  a contact  between  the  two  lines  of  action  that  are  af- 
terwards developed. 

Throughout  the  novel  the  struggle  between  positive  and  negative 
forces  is  clearly  apparent,  because  the  story  is  one  in  which  actual 
strife  and  contention  form  the  theme.  In  the  first  half  the  nega- 
tive side,  that  led  by  leech,  has  the  upper  hand,  although  the  posi- 
tive, of  which  Steve  Allen  is  the  head,  occasionally  asserts  itself, 
as  in  the  ”Ku  Klux"  episode.  Ruth  Welch  is  the  dominant  force  of 
both  climaxes,  for  the  consequences  of  Leech's  evil  ambition  begin 
to  a op  ear  soon  after  her  arrival  in  the  South,  and  the  point  of 
highest  interest  is  reached  when  she  is  married  to  Steve. 


, 


. 


. 


. 

• 

. ’ 

• 

. 

• 

. 

, 

• 

. 

. 


54 

The  somb.erness  of  the  main  plot  is  relieved  from  time  to  time 
by  the  gayer  scenes  of  Captain  Thurston's  wooing  of  the  provoking 
Elizabeth  Dockett.  Mr.  Page  has  hit  upon  an  excellent  device  for 
creating  suspense  by  having  the  negative  and  positive  forces  each 
divided  into  two  elements,  distinct,  yet  united:  at  one  time  Hiram 
Still  opposes  Jacqueline  Gray,  at  another  Jonadab  Leech  and  Steve 
Allen  are  in  conflict. 

The  plot  is  motivated  correctly,  inasmuch  as  each  event  grows 
out  of  a preceding  action,  but  it  sometimes  happens  that  the  con- 
nection is  obscured  by  the  intervening  scenes.  Major  Welch  is  one 
of  the  visitors  from  the  North  at  the  wedding  in  the  second  chapter, 
but  he  has  little  further  to  do  until  the  second  half  of  the  story 
is  reached.  His  reason  for  re-visiting  the  South  grows  out  of  the 
necessity  for  watching  over  the  investments  made  by  himself  and  Can- 
tain  Middleton.  Middleton  is  the  other  chance  guest  at  the  wedding 
celebration,  and  he  later  has  charge  of  the  Federal  troops  sent  to 
keep  peace  in  the  county.  Chance  really  figures  but  little  in 
bringing  all  the  characters  together,  yet  the  connecting  links  be- 
tween events  are  not  always  so  placed  that  the  reader  feels  the  mo- 
tivation. The  same  inaoility  on  the  part  of  the  author  to  develop 
his  plot  correctly  is  responsible  for  the  unequal  shading  in  motiva- 
tion. 

Mr.  Page  follows  both  Dickens  and  Scott  in  his  character  por- 
trayal. Like  the  people  of  Dickens  each  character  has  certain 
definite  traits  which  change  but  slig,htly  during  the  course  of  the 
novel,  but  these  characteristics  are  not  stressed  to  the  extent  of 
grot esqueness , as  Dickens  might  have  done.  Where  Dickens  would  have 
repeatedly  employed  an  aporopriate  epithet  in  mentioning  a character 


- 


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■ 


. 


. 

. 


. 


55 


or  would  have  continually  emphasized  certain  character-determining 
details  of  clothing  or  of  figure,  Mr.  Page  speaks  of  such  matters 
only  once.  Rather  than  use  the  device  of  a frequently  repeated 
adjective  or  phrase,  Mr.  Page  has  chosen  to  employ  Pickens 1 s little 
trick,  although  it  is  by  no  means  peculiar  to  him,  of  giving  to  the 
men  and  women  of  "Red  Rock"  proper  names  or  surnames  that  are  in- 
dices of  character.  "Still"  indicates  the  sly  craftiness  of  the 
false  overseer;  "Leech"  is  significant  of  the  Provost's  efforts  to 
drain  away  the  life-blood  of  the  county's  citizens;  "Jacqueline" 
connotes  the  romanticism  of  the  ante-bellum  period;  and  "Allen",  a 
good  old  Southern  name,  sums  up  all  the  chivalry  and  loyalty  of 
the  Virginian  character.  Instead  of  uroceeding  with  the  portrayal 
of  mental,  moral,  and  ohysical  traits  in  the  manner  of  Pickens,  Mr. 
Page  presents  his  men  and  women  in  significant  scenes,  but  the  dif- 
ficulty is,  that  there  is  not  enough  variety  in  the  kinds  of  deeds 
these  people  do.  Steve  Allen  can  always  be  counted  upon  to  be  noble 
and  manly,  while  Leech,  time  after  time,  bullies  those  weaker  than 
himself  and  fauns  before  those  upon  whom  he  cannot  impose.  This 
difference  from  the  style  of  Pickens  is  due  to  the  fact  that  in  Mr. 
Page's  story,  as  in  the  novels  of  Scott,  the  chief  interest  is  in 
action,  rather  than  in  character.  So,  even  leaving  out  the  minute 
descriptions  of  personal  aupearance  and  the  lengthy  recitals  of  past 
accomplishments,  which  Scott  would  have  included,  there  are  scenes 
wherein  the  men  and  women  of  the  novel  present  themselves  directly 
through  characteristic  action.  In  this  treatment  of  character.  Mar. 
Page  shows  the  effect  which  his  early  love  of  and  acquaintance  with 
the  "Waverley  Novels"  had  uoon  his  own  literary  life,  together  with 
the  influence  of  the  Pickens  enthusiasm  that  was  so  dominant  in 


r , 


, 


. 


. 


r 


. 


- 


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* 

. 

- 

. 

. 


. 


. 

56 


America  just  after  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

An  excellent  example  of  the  simplicity  of  Mr.  Page's  descrip- 
tions of  character  is  found  in  the  passage  narrating  Ruth  Welch's 
first  meeting  with  Blair  Cary. 

’'Ruth  found  herself  astonished  at  the 
appearance  of  her  hostess.  Her  face  was  so  refined  and  her  figure 
so  slim  that  it  occurred  to  Ruth  that  she  might  he  an  invalid.  Her 
dress  was  simple  to  nlainness,  plainer  than  Ruth  had  ever  seen  the 
youngest  girl  wear,  and  her  breastpin  was  nothing  but  a brass  button, 
such  as  soldiers  wear  on  their  coats;  yet  her  manners  were  as  com- 
posed and  * gracious  as  if  she  had  been  a lady  and  in  society  for 
years. " 1 ' 

Very  few  are  the  details  here,  and  yet  so  deftly  selected  are  they 
for  their  connotative  value,  that  Blair's  sweetness  of  face  and  of 
character  is  clearly  felt,  even  though  it  is  not  actually  seen.  The 
one  brass  button  that  she  wears  speaks  volumes  for  her  loyalty  to 
the  South  and  for  her  grief  for  the  sorrows  of  her  land. 

To  continue  to  analyze  this  novel  and  to  call  attention  to  its 
merits  and  its  defects,  would  be  to  lose  sight  of  its  real  worth, 
would  be  to  miss  the  author's  purpose  in  writing  it.  "Red  Rock"  is 
essentially  a continuation  of  his  efforts  to  inform  the  North  of  the 
true  Southern  situation.  Greater  mistakes  could  hardly  have  been 
made  by  the  North  during  Reconstruction  days;  yet  the  exhausted 
South  suffered  heroically  these  further  afflictions.  Disguising  his 
firmness  with  his  habitual  gentleness,  Mr.  Page  has  told  the  story 
of  this  dark  period  in  a way  that  cannot  fail  to  impress  his  readers. 
Without  consisting  of  a succession  of  depressing  and  sickening 
scenes,  which  would  cause  the  impulse  to  drive  it  all  from  mind  as 
quickly  as  possible,  "Red  Rock"  brings  the  knowledge  that  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  United  States  has  not  always  been  entirely  democratic 
in  its  workings.  After  this  knowledge  comes  the  desire  to  profit 


1.  Red  Rock,  IV.,  459-60 


57 


by  the  errors  of  the  past  in  the  problems  of  the  future.  To  accom- 
plish this  purpose  Thomas  Kelson  Page  wrote  "Bed  Bock”. 

"Gordon  Xeith",  the  second  of  the  novels  (1903),  shows  the  ef- 
fect of  Mr.  Page's  contact  with  the  social  life  of  the  Sast,  into 
which  he  was  drawn  by  his  second  marriage.  In  this  novel  the  author 
writes  of  the  beginning  of  the  evolution  of  the  South  in  the  days 
following  Reconstruction,  and  of  the  contemporary  social  and  finan- 
cial life  of  New  York  City.  The  juxtaposition  of  these  two  themes 
is  indicative  of  Mr.  Page's  new  interests,  and  the  questionable  suc- 
cess of  the  treatment  goes  far  to  show  how  artificial,  after  all,  he 
considered  his  new  life.  Although  he  was  acquainted  with  the  chang- 
es that  were  taking  place  in  the  South,  of  the  development  of  miner- 
al resources,  for  instance,  Mr.  Page's  real  sympathies  were  not  with 
the  new,  but  with  the  old.  -Sven  if  he  visited  often  in  New  York  and 
had,  through  his  wife,  acquaintance  with  financial  interests  there, 
he  was  not  a part  of  it.  Therefore,  when  he  came  to  write  "Gordon 
Xeith",  he  did  not  succeed  in  entering  completely  into  the  spirit 
of  the  day. 

Gordon  Xeith  is  the  son  of  an  impoverished  plantation-owner. 

In  consequence  of  a few  years  of  teaching  in  an  elementary  school  in 
a remote  mountainous  region  of  western  Viiginia,  Gordon  becomes  in- 
teresued  in  the  community.  later  he  studies  civil  engineering,  and 
in  time  is  able  to  serve  as  intermediary  between  the  local  land- 
owners  and  some  New  York  financiers  who  want  to  control  the  mines 
and  railroads  of  the  new  region.  Gordon  is  being  drawn  into  the 
whirl  of  finance,  partly  by  his  duties  and  partly  by  his  regard  for 
a wealthy  widow,  when  he  is  brought  to  his  senses  by  the  domestic 
troubles  of  a friend,  one  of  the  magnates.  In  the  end  he  marries  a 


. 


. 

, 


. 


. 

, 


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* 


. 


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58 


poor  girl,  and  .goes  back  to  live  in  his  old  home,  which  he  has  just 
re-purchased. 

The  plot  of  "Gordon  Keith"  is  much  better  constructed  than  that 
of  "Red  Rock".  The  various  themes  are  deftly  handled.  Events  occur 
naturally,  without  sudden  necessities  to  account  for  situations.  The 
little  happenings  of  Gordon's  visit  to  Shgland  as  a little  boy  moti- 
vate later  meetings  with  Wickersham,  Wentworth,  and  Terpy,  while 
David  Dennison's  love  for  Phrony  Tripper  accounts  for  his  presence  in 
New  York  to  search  for  her. 

Sometimes  the  plot-devel opment  is  too  slow.  Toward  the  end,  for 
instance,  after  the  resolution  of  Wentworth's  difficulties,  which 
forms  the  climax  of  the  story,  it  takes  three  more  chapters  to  bring 
Loi3  Huntington  and  Gordon  Keith  together.  One  reason  for  this  re- 
tardation is  that  the  author  has  not  linked  up  the  Alice  Lancaster 
theme  closely  enough  to  the  other  parts  of  the  plot  for  the  narrative 
to  be  ended  soon  after  the  climax.  Another  reason  for  the  additional 
final  chapters  is  his  necessity  for  disposing  of  some  of  his  minor 
characters.  Into  such  strong  light  ha3  he  brought  some  of  them  - Mrs 
Nailor,  Miss  Abigail  Brooke,  and  Dr.  Balsam,  for  example  - that  he 
cannot  dismiss  them  with  a word. 

Mr.  Page  has  created  entirely  too  many  characters;  no  doubt,  be- 
cause of  the  influence  of  Dickens.  It  would  surely  have  been  better, 
since  the  author  felt  the  need  of  so  many  actors  uoon  his  stage,  for 
him  to  have  touched  lightly  the  minor  personages,  and  to  have  given 
more  body  to  the  important  characters.  The  effect  the  reader  gets 
is,  that  such  people  as  Dr.  Balsam  and  the  senior  Mrs.  Wentworth  are 
more  real  than  Gordon  Keith  and  Alice  Lancaster.  This  is  because  the 
minor  characters  receive  undue  attention,  while  the  major  actors  are 


. 


. 


. 


. 

i 


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■ 


. 


, 


. 

. 


. 


59 


not  proportionately  developed,  and  so  remain  somewhat  flat  and  dull. 

The  character-treatment  shows  the  influence  of  Pickens  in  still 
another  way  than  in  that  of  the  number:  one  or  two  traits  of  charac- 
ter are  developed  in  each  to  the  exclusion  of  all  others.  There  is, 
then,  a tendency  towards  caricature  which  the  author  clearly  did  not 
intend,  since  this  book  was  not  written  for  such  purposes  of  social 
reform  as  guided  Pickens.  Gordon  Keith  is  almost  never  anything  but 
a gentleman  of  impeccable  habits,  while  Ferdy  Wickersham  is  nothing 
but  mean  and  weazened  of  soul  from  start  to  finish.  Alice  Lancaster 
is  continually  so  unapproachable  in  her  self-centered  loveliness, 
that  even  the  hero  finds  he  cannot  love  her  as  he  thought  he  did. 

Description  plays  but  little  part  in  "Gordon  Keith".  This  lack 
of  description  is  not  felt  by  the  reader,  because  there  is  always 
some  action  taking  place.  Whatever  physical  description  is  needed, 
is  given  simply  and  briefly.  Portrayal  of  character  is  accomplished 
through  significant  incident.  This  method  is  an  excellent  one,  if, 
as  should  be  done  in  any  method,  there  is  sufficient  variety  of  epi- 
sode. But,  as  was  suggested  above,  Mr.  Page  has  failed  to  select  his 
events  in  such  a way  as  to  throw  several  different  asoects  into  re- 
lief. In  so  long  a narrative  as  this,  occasionally  change  in  the 
continuity  of  the  movement  may,  with  good  reason,  be  supplied  through 
a few  pages  of  description  or  of  direct  comment.  The  reader  may  be- 
come as  breathle39  mentally  as  a long-distanc e runner  does  physical- 
ly, if  the  author  makes  his  characters  move  from  scene  to  scene  with- 
out pause. 

Mr.  Page's  hesitancy  to  come  before  his  audience  with  personal 


comments  upon  the  men  and  women  of  his  story,  and  the  infrequency  of 
his  philosophizing  uoon  various  topics  oertinent  to  his  story  are 


t 

> 

- 

- 


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60 


results  of  his  training  in  short-story  writing.  There  conciseness 
was  the  end  in  view.  Singleness  of  effect  must  “be  gained  before 
everything.  The  restrictions  in  space  gave  little  room  in  which  the 
author  could  speak  his  own  thoughts  about  his  characters.  He  was 
forced  to  chose  his  scenes  carefully,  so  that  they  would  both  fur- 
ther the  action  and  develop  character.  It  is  these  rules  that  Mr. 
Page  has  followed  in  writing  "Gordon  Keith". 

This  novel,  much  more  than  either  of  the  others,  has  caught  the 
eyes  of  the  critics.  Why  this  should  be  so,  it  is  difficult  to  state 
Perhaps,  when  "Red  Rock;”  was  published,  the  reviewers  thought  it 
wisest  to  allow  the  first  novel  of  an  author  long  Known  only  as  a 
writer  of  short-stories  to  stand  or  fall  upon  its  own  merits  without 
comment;  while,  no  doubt,  by  the  time  "John  Marvel,  Assistant”  ap- 
peared, the  public  eye  had  turned  to  other  writers,  and  the  novels  of 
other  men  were  of  more  immediate  importance. 

One  of  the  most  concise,  yet  all-inclusive,  criticisms  of  "Gor- 

, (i) 

don  Keith",  is  that  by  H.  K,  Viele  in  The  Bookman  for  July,  1903. 

"With  every  confidence  in  his  ability  to  some  day  write  a full-fledg- 
ed romance,  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  author  has  not  attained  per- 
fection at  a bound.  The  grip  of  the  Short  Story  habit  is  still 
strong  upon  him;  the  glamour  of  the  rounded  episode.  He  is  too  apt 
to  give  undue  significance  to  minor  people  and  incidents  that  have 
but  little  bearing  on  his  tale.  And  the  result  is  often  a diverted 
interest,  and  in  the  end  an  overcrowded  stage,  which  can  be  cleared 
only  through  a most  alarming  death-rate.  But  Mr.  Page’s  episodes  are 
always  entertaining,  sometimes  exciting,  and  thrilling  more  than 
once.  His  style  is  ever  finished  and  agreeable,  none  the  less  so  for 
frequent,  all  unconscious  lapses  into  local  idiom.  His  sentiment  is 
never  mawkish  and  his  drama,  if  at  times  a trifle  Tmelo’,  is  always 
wholesome. " 

(2) 

A London  reviewer,  in  outlining  the  plot  of  "Gordon  Keith",  is 
unconsciously  humorous  in  his  conception  of  American  customs. 

"The 


hero's  father,  at  an  early  stage  of  the  tale,  is  acting  as  a sort  of 

1.  Viele^  Herman  Knickerbocker;  Bookman , 17:513-4,  July,  1903. 

2.  Athenaeum,  2:281,  August  29,  1903. 


f 

• 

■ 

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r 

t 

•;"u  ; . 

. 


' 


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, 


61 


bailiff  for  the  New  York:  parvenu  who  has  bought  his  mansion  in  the 
South.  The  hero  himself  nicks  un  his  education  at  odd  times,  chiefly 
through  the  generosity  of  old  friends  of  his  family,  and  becomes  in 
turn  schoolmaster,  stage-coach  driver,  mining  engineer,  and  financial 
magnate.  We  hasten  to  add  that  the  reader  is  given  the  full  benefit 
of  his  various  love  affairs,  and  that  he  is  a catholic  lover  of  the 
s ex . " 

(1) 

The  literary  critic  of  The  Nation  finds  the  least  to  say  in  fa- 
vor of  "Gordon  Keith". 


"Mr.  Page’s  account  of  Keith  from  boyhood  to 
middle  age  is  tediously  circumstantial,  showing  no  sense  of  artistic 
selection,  and  with  hardly  a gleam  of  vivacity  or  a moment  of  strong, 
stirring  emotion.  Keith  is  never  just  a man,  but  always  a hero  - 
in  defeat  or  victory  always  right.  Ferdy  Wickersham,  with  whom  Keith 
comes  constantly  in  contact  and  conflict,  has,  on  the  other  hand,  a 
quite  unnatural  talent  for  being  always  wrong.  A bad  son,  a bad 
friend,  a beguiler  and  betrayer  of  women,  he  might  point  an  imores- 
sive  moral  were  it  not  that  he  is  just  too  bad  to  believe  in  at  all. 
Most  of  the  people  in  the  book  (and  there  are  a great  many)  are  like 
the  two  principal  figures,  too  immaculate  or  too  depressed.  The 
clergyman,  Mr.  Rimmon,  is  a survival  of  eighteenth-century  5hgl  ish 
fiction.  We  have  met  him  in  the  pages  of  Fielding  and  Smollett,  and 
learn  with  some  surprise  and  horror  that  he  is  now  actually  a shep- 
herd of  aristocratic  souls  in  the  city  of  New  York,  and  made  welcome 
to  a cup  of  tea  any  afternoon  in  houses  of  the  highest  fashion  . . . 
The  incidents  through  which  Keith,  his  friends,  and  enemies  pass  to 
ultimate  destiny  are  sometimes  thrilling  to  a degree,  sometimes  so 
caoricious,  sometimes  so  hackneyed,  that  the  reader's  final  ircrores- 
sion  is  of  having  assisted  at  a high-flown,  conventional  melodrama. 

It  is  unfortunate  that  this  impression  is  the  strongest  and  most 
lasting  derived  from  a book  to  the  writing  of  which  thought  and  know- 
ledge and  patience  have  been  given  without  stint." 

It  is  unfortunate,  too,  that  this  critic  has  ended  his  estimate 
of  Mr.  Page  on  such  a minor  note,  because  he  leaves  the  wrong  impres- 
sion of  his  o wn  insight,  for  the  first  sentences  of  his  little  arti- 
cle sum  up  Mr.  Page’s  literary  career  excellently. 


"When  Mr.  Page  be- 
gan to  write  wtories,  he  probably  had  no  deliberate  intention  of  be- 
coming a social  historian  of  the  South;  nevertheless,  today  a vivid 
and  apparently  truthful  conception  of  Southern  society  - of  the  ruin 
of  the  old  order  and  the  rise  of  the  new  - may  be  formed  by  reading 
his  books  in  the  order  of  their  oroduction.  Kis  early  tales  collect- 
ively stand  as  an  idyll  of  the  old  South,  enshrining  the  romantic  as- 
pects of  its  urosperity  and  the  tragedy  of  its  disruption.  ’Red  Rock’ 
delineates  the  unhapny  struggle  for  adjustment  to  new  conditions  that 
marked  the  period  of  Reconstruction,  and  ’Gordon  Keith’  heralds  the 


1.  The  Nation,  77:118,  August  6,  1903 


62 


dawn  of  an  era  of  commercial  and  industrial  development,” 

The  fact  that  Mr.  Page's  writings  are  held  together  by  a progressive 
time  element  is  very  important,  because  it  assists  in  the  realization 
of  the  value  of  this  author's  contribution  to  modern  literature.  In 
keeping  pace  with  the  interests  of  the  United  States, he  has  justified 
his  claim  upon  the  reading-public  of  America. 

"John  Marvel,  Assistant”  goes  a step  farther  still  than  Mr. 

Page's  previous  writings.  In  this  novel,  the  Worth  and  the  South 

have  become  one  again  in  thought  and  effort,  and  have  turned  their 

attention  to  the  West,  which  is  rapidly  becoming  the  central  force  in 

the  United  States.  Although  the  first  few  scenes  are  laid  in  the 

South,  and  although  the  chief  actor,  Henry  Slave,  is  a Southerner, 

the  real  drama  of  "John  Marvel,  Assistant"  is  staged  in  a Western 

city.  These  facts  are  significant  both  of  the  change  in  Mr.  Page's 

o wn  interests,  and  of  the  change  in  the  interests  of  the  United 

States.  They  are  of  further  importance  in  contributing  to  the  force 

of  the  enithet  "Social  Historian",  which  has  been  applied  with  such 

(1) 

appropriateness  to  Mr.  Page. 

3y  1909,  when  "John  Marvel,  Assistant",  the  third  and  last  of 
the  Page  novels,  came  from  the  press,  the  question  of  negro  slavery 
in  America  was  nearly  fifty  years  in  the  past.  Problems  of  other 
kinds  of  human  bondage,  however,  the  united  Worth  and  South  had  to 
solve.  The  cyclonic  rapidity  of  the  growth  of  industry  from  the 
'sixties  onward,,  mad,  feverish  years  when  thought  was  focussed  upon 
ends  to  the  neglect  of  means,  had  evolved  a society  where  privileged 
hundreds  enslaved  millions.  Wot  even  today  have  satisfactory  methods 
been  found  for  balancing  the  uneven  social  scales,  nor  may  the  "con- 


1.  Toulmin,  H.A.  Jr.,  Social  Historians 


. 


' 


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• < 

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63 


summation  devoutly  to  be  wished"  he  expected  for  many,  many  years  yet. 
Suggestions  from  here,  there,  and  everywhere  must  be  assayed,  with 
only  a tiny  grain  of  the  gold  of  knowledge  from  the  hundredth  theory, 
perhaps.  Multitudes  of  earnest,  self-forgetful  men  and  women  must 
devote  their  lives,  just  as  thousands  have  already  done,  to  the  re- 


lease of  the  wage-earning  class  from  subjection  to  the  wage-paying. 

Thomas  Nelson  Page  is  one  of  those  who  have  already  tried  to 
"do  their  bit"  in  the  struggle  to  establish  the  rights  of  the  lower 
classes.  "John  Marvel,  Assistant"  is  his  contribution  to  the  general 
cause  of  the  workingman.  One  critic  values  the  novel  thus: 

" 1 J ohn 

Marv  el.  Assistant1,  by  Thomas  Nelson  Page  . . . , is  a real  book.  In 
breadth  of  treatment  and  penetration  into  our  social  conditions  it  is 
the  most  mature  which  Mr.  Page  has  yet  written.  It  lacks  some  of  the 
delicacy  of  his  more  romantic  work,  but  it  is  dignified  by  earnest- 
ness and  intensity.  The  title  does  not  show  the  precise  motif  of  the 
story.  This  is  really  the  autobiographical  account  of  the  transfor- 
mation of  a careless,  brilliant  young  Southerner  into  a lawyer  of 
character  and  force.  His  varied  adventures  in  making  his  fortune  are 
told  naturally  and  sympathetically.  The  real  spirit  of  the  book, 
however,  appears  in  the  attitude  toward  the  poor  of  John  Marvel,  a 
young  clergyman,  and  the  young  Jew,  Wolff ert.  Mr.  Page  makes  the 
mistake  of  painting  the  labor  unions  too  black  and  dilating  too  much 
on  the  superiority  of  the  Jew;  his  conception  of  the  social  signifi- 
cance in  Christianity  is  evidently  that  of  the  ambulance;  but  in  his 
portrayal  of  the  whole,  he  evidently  means  to  include  the  social 
transition  now  in  process.  As  a treatise  on  sociology  it  is  amateur- 
ish, but  as  a story  it  is  well  worth  reading." 

In  the  opening  sentence  of  this  novel,  Mr.  Page  takes  precau- 
tions against  any  critical  attacks  by  saying: 

"I  shall  feel  at  liberty 
to  tell  my  story  in  my  own  way;  rambling  along  at  my  own  gait;  now 
going  from  point  to  point;  now  tearing  ahead;  now  stopping  to  rest  or 
to  ruminate,  and  even  straying  from  thpppath  whenever  I think  a di- 
gression will  be  to  my  own  enjoyment." 

Then  easily,  informally,  he  proceeds  to  his  story. 

The  first  few  chapters  of  the  novel  relate  some  of  the  college 

1.  The  World  To-day.  18:220,  February,  1910. 

2.  "John  Marvel,  Assistant",  1,  (Scribner's  Sons,  New  York,  1909). 


. 


. 


, 


, 


. 


*» 


. 

. 

* 

. 


. 

. r 


. 

, 


. 


64 


experiences  of  Henry  Slave,  Leo  Wolff ert,  and  John  Marvel  at  a South- 
ern school.  All  three  of  them  are  above  the  average  in  mental  abili- 
ty, but  Henry  is  so  attracted  by  social  delights  that  his  study  is 
pitiably  neglected.  Leo,  a Jew,  is  passionately  interested  in  soci- 
ology, while  John  devotes  himself  to  religion  with  the  piety  and  self' 
lessness  of  a saint. 

From  the  title  of  the  novel  and  from  the  order  in  which  the 
characters  are  presented  - introducing  John  third,  with  dramatic  ef- 
fectiveness - the  reader  feels  that  the  young  minister  is  to  be  the 
central  figure.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  author  meant  to  make  John 
Marvel  the  guiding  force  in  the  story  and  the  resolving  factor  in  the 
final  climax,  but,  since  Mr.  Page  had  not  the  literary  power  of  a 
Shakespeare  writing  a "Julius  Caesar”,  the  novel  does  not  do  what  is 
purposed  for  it.  After  the  opening  scenes,  perhaps  because  it  is 
told  in  the  first  person  by  Henry  Glave,  John  Marvel  is  not  empha- 
sized in  just  the  way  he  should  have  been  to  make  the  reader  feel 
that,  but  for  him,  the  end  would  have  been  different.  Perhaps,  if 
the  story  had  been  seen  through  the  eyes  of  some  inactively  concerned 
fourth  person,  or  even  through  those  of  Wolffert,  the  novel  would 
justify  the  title  selected. 

As  it  is  told,  however,  Henry  Glave,  after  having  nearly  failed 
to  be  graduated  because  he  has  not  applied  himself  steadily  to  his 
lav/  course,  decides  to  go  to  the  West  and  try  to  make  up  for  his 
wasted  time.  On  his  way  to  his  destination,  he  meets  on  the  train 
Eleanor  Leigh,  whose  father  owns  railroad  and  traction  property,  and 
Mrs.  McNeil,  a woman  of  very  straightened  means,  whose  husband  works 
on  Mr.  Leigh’s  streetcar-line.  Thus  Henry  begins  his  acquaintance 
with  the  extremes  of  society.  At  this  point  the  real  action  begins. 


65 


and  it  is  concerned  with  Glave's  participation,  together  with  that  of 
Marvel  and  of  Voj.fi ert,  in  the  labor  troubles,  ending  in  a strike, 
which  precede  the  final  compromise  between  the  divergent  interests  of 
the  employers  and  the  employees  of  the  particular  Western  city  of  the 

novel. 

Henry  Glave  finds  it  very  difficult  to  make  a beginning  at  the 
law,  because  he  has  neither  means  nor  influence.  His  privations 
strengthen  his  character,  giving  him,  assisted  by  the  teachings  of 
Marvel  and  o±  Wolff ert,  a clear  vision  to  appreciate  the  genuineness 
of  the  very  poor  people  among  whom  his  circumstances  force  him  to 
live.  For  a long  time  a strike  has  been  threatening,  for  the  trac- 
tion-owners have  borne  down  cruelly  and  viciously  upon  their  employ- 
ees. As  the  weeks  pass  the  situation  grows  more  and  more  acute, 
despite  the  efforts  of  such  men  as  Marvel  to  effect  a compromise,  for 
certain  unscrupulous  strike  agitators  are  too  successful  in  their 
schemes  for  disaster.  The  days  of  terror  burst  upon  the  city,  bring- 
ing sorrow,  suffering,  and  death.  For  a period  it  seems  that  ELeanor 
and  Henry  will  be  victims,  but,  with  the  quieting  of  the  storm,  there 
comes  knowledge  and  hope,  the  knowledge  of  their  mutual  love,  and  the 
hope  of  their  future  life  together. 

Upon  the  evidence  of  this  synopsis,  the  criticism  a few  para- 
graphs back  of  the  appropriateness  of  the  title  may  legitimately  be 
required  to  be  defended.  It  is  true  that  it  is  the  earnest  young 
minister  who  solves  for  Eleanor  Leigh  the  problem  of  her  fruitless 
social  life,  and  it  is  he  who  helps  Glave  to  understand  the  excel- 
lence and  worth  of  the  laboring -class.  Asain  it  is  John  Marvel  who 
tells  Henry  that  it  is  not  the  minister  but  the  lawyer  whom  ELeanor 
loves.  These  three  points  could  be  established  without  mentioning 


f 


- 


f 


■ 


66 


all  the  sacrifices  Marvel  makes  in  behalf  of  the  streetcar  workers. 

Bat  the  real  justification  of  the  criticism  lies  in  the  lengthy,  de- 
tailed narration  of  the  fall  and  rise  of  Henry  Glave's  fortunes.  The 
theme  of  Glave's  personal  relations  with  shyster  lawyer  Peck,  which 
is  technically  minor  to  the  story  in  which  Marv el  figures,  is  devel- 
oped with  such  thoroughness,  that  the  reader  is  as  much  interested  in 
having  Glave  triumph  over  him,  as  to  have  the  economic  conditions  ad- 
justed. Peck,  in  his  connection  with  Henry,  is  stressed  so  heavily 
that,  instead  of  being  one  of  several,  equally  important,  negative 
forces,  he  comes  to  be  far  more  prominent  than  any  of  the  others;  and 
hence,  being  a personal  enemy  of  Glave's  he  pushes  the  young  lawyer 
into  the  literary  foreground  so  boldly  that  Marvel  is  almost  hidden. 

In  characterization,  Mr.  Page  has  here  done  much  better  work  thar 
in  the  other  two  novels;  the  men  and  women  react  more  sharply  to  theii 
environment,  and  the  succeeding  events  of  the  plot  more  often  leave 
their  impressions  for  good  or  bad  upon  the  characters.  This  is  par- 
ticularly true  of  the  major  characters.  Henry  Glave  is  at  first  a 
thoughtless  young  man,  caring  more  for  the  foolish  dissipations  of 
college  society  than  for  the  serious  study  of  his  text  books.  From 
the  time  of  his  delayed  graduation,  when  he  is  shocked  into  a reali- 
zation of  how  seriously  his  wasted  time  has  handicapped  him  in  the 
race  with  his  classmates  towards  success,  until  the  time  of  his  mar- 
riage with  Eleanor  Leigh,  he  is  seen  in  situation  after  situation, 
each  of  which  helps  to  develop  some  good  traits  of  his  character  or  to 
destroy  some  bad  ones,  the  treatment  of  such  minor  personages  as 

Peck  and  Pushkin,  though,  there  is  often  the  old  Dickensian  tendency 
toward  caricature.  These  two  men  are  very  much  the  same  from  begin- 


ling  to  end  - the  shyster  lawyer,  mean,  servile,  tricky,  the  pseudo- 


9 


X 


67 


nobleman,  vicious,  hypocritical,  unmoral.  In  them  each  new  situation 
reveals,  not  a new  trait  of  character,  but  a deepened  impression  of 
old  aspects. 

This  caricaturing  of  the  minor  characters  has  its  parallel  in 
the  presentation  of  the  labor  situations.  Since  such  men  as  Peck  and 
Pushkin  are  the  spokesmen  of  the  unions,  it  follows  that  these  or- 
ganizations and  their  standards  and  desires  take  gloomy  coloring  from 
the  dirty  lives  of  their  leaders.  Mr.  Page  ha3  at  times  confused  the 
personal  and  political  motives  of  the  union  representatives.  For 
instance,  when  Pushkin  abducts  Elsa  Xoewen,  the  Count's  private  grudge 
against  Glave  and  his  own  moral  weakness  motivate  the  act,  rather  thar 
his  desire  to  further  the  power  of  the  union.  But  the  episode  is 
developed  so  as  to  assume  political  importance,  so  that  the  nrivate 
significance  is  shadowed. 

nJohn  Marvel,  Assistant"  offers  Mr.  Page's  style  at  its  best. 
Smoothly,  clearly,  it  flows  steadily  onward.  There  is  no  apparent 
striving  for  effect.  The  words  are  the  common  words  of  everyday  dis- 
course, placed  together  with  all  the  naivete^  of  ordinary  conversa- 
tion. Allusions  are  almost  unknown,  except  in  three  or  four  of  the 
chapter  titles,  and  these  - among  them  "Paden-Aran"  and  "I  Pitch  My 
Tent"  - suggest  the  religious  theme  which  John  Marvel  personifies. 

Mr.  Page's  natural  simplicity,  his  unassuming  kindliness  prevent  him 
from  forcing  his  story  upon  his  readers  with  any  rhetorical  tricks. 

It  is  told  quietly,  as  though  the  narrator  is  sitting  with  a friend, 
in  comfortably  cushioned  ease, before  the  open  grate,  conversing  in 
the  fire-light. 


. 


, 

- 


. 


68 


VII.  IN  THE  TWENTIETH  CMTURY. 

After  presenting  "Red  Rock"  in  1898,  Mr.  Page  wrote  and  pub- 
lished two  stories  for  children  before  the  nineteenth  century  closed. 
These  were  "Two  Prisoners"  and  "Santa  Glaus’s  Partner".  The  former 
tells  how  a poor  little  crippled  girl,  who  lived  with  a drunken  woman 
in  a tenement,  found  her  mother.  The  latter  is  a variation  of  Dick- 
on's "Christmas  Carol"  theme,  in  which  a financier,  who  has  been  con- 
centrating his  life  upon  the  accumulation  of  money,  realizes  the  joy 
of  giving.  Thus  the  literary  work  of  Mr.  Page  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury ended,  oddly  enough,  with  stories  of  children  and  of  Christmas, 
two  of  the  most  important  of  the  themes  in  the  literature  of  those 
hundred  years.  It  was  Charles  Dickens  who  was  most  responsible  for 
the  prominence  of  stories  about  children  and  of  stories  about  Christ- 
mas. Eis  own  childhood  in  the  time  of  the  "industrial  revolution" 
taught  him  the  social  importance  of  children.  This  conception  in- 
creased for  him  the  sentimental  significance  of  the  Christmas  season, 
causing  him  to  seize  upon  every  opportunity  to  emphasize  in  his  own 
novels  the  beauty  of  all  childhood  and  of  the  Child  whose  birthday 
is  celebrated.  For  Thomas  Nelson  Page  to  continue  as  Dickens  had  be- 
gun was  only  natural,  because,  in  his  o wn  boyhood  on  Oakland  Planta- 
tion the  old  English  holiday  customs  had  been  merrily  observed  every 

year.  Then,  too,  after  his  second  marriage,  when  his  wife's  daugh- 
ters brought  other  children  into  his  home,  his  thoughts  dwelt  often 
upon  the  pleasures  of  his  own  childhood,  pleasures  which,  each  year. 


' 


. 


. 


' 


— . 


^!=S==S—S=SS 


69 


culminated  in  the  Christmas  festivities. 

Just  as  Mr.  Page's  last  story  for  the  nineteenth  century  was  one 
about  Christmas,  so  was  the  first  one  of  the  twentieth  century  one  of 
the  holidaytime.  It  was  "A  Captured  Santa  Claus",  which  appeared  in 
1902.  In  this  narrative  a Confederate  officer  promises  to  bring  pre- 
sents to  his  little  children.  He  nearly  fails  to  keep  his  word,  how- 
ever, because  he  falls  for  a time  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy.  "A 
Captured  Santa  Claus"  is  not  the  last  of  Mr.  Page's  Christmas  stories 
by  any  means.  This  happy  season,  with  its  traditions,  its  customs, 
and  its  significance,  is  a constantly  reappearing  theme  throughout 
the  decade  and  more  that  preceded  Mr.  Page' 3 departure  for  Italy  as 
ambassador,  a date  which  seems  to  have  brought,  practically,  the  li- 
terary career  of  Mr.  Page  to  a close. 

Although  Mr.  Page  decided,  about  the  beginning  of  the  century, 
to  resume  his  study  of  the  lav/,  he  did  not  at  once  forsake  literature. 
In  fact,  it  is  difficult  to  feel  that  he  gave  much  time  to  legal  af- 
fairs until  after  "John  Marvel,  Assistant"  was  finished  in  1909,  for 
Mr.  Page  wrote  many  short-stories  and  essays  in  the  years  after  his 
decision  was  made.  In  1904  the  collection  of  narratives  called  "Bred 
in  the  Bone"  was  published.  Mechanically  these  short-stories  are  not 
particularly  good,  but  otherwise  their  style  is  so  simple  and  their 
episodes  so  interesting  that  much  may  be  forgiven  them,  -^n  the  same 
year,  also,  appeared  "The  Negro:  the  Southerner's  Problem",  a very 
able  statement  of  the  negro  situation. 

There  was  a pleasant  variation  in  Mr.  Page's  literary  offerings, 
when,  in  1906,  his  second  volume  of  poems,  "The  Coast  of  Bohemia" 
came  from  the  press.  These  lyrics  are  sincere  and  unaffected  in  tone. 
They  are  not  always  facile  in  expression,  but  they  are  artistic  poet* 


, 


, 


. 


' 


70 


ical  endeavors  upon  the  part  of  a prose-writ er  who,  in  his  devotion 

to  high  things,  has  always  been  a poet  in  thought  if  not  in  reality. 

Their  very  lack  of  self-consciousness  makes  them  ring  true,  and  often 

they  show  an  ease  and  freedom  of  phrasing  which  is  particularly  hap- 

(1) 

py.  In  these  poems  Mr.  Page  has  tried  his  hand  at  many  things.  "The 

Bent  Monk",  with  its  uncommon  rhyme-scheme  and  with  its  obsolete 

words,  is  a romantic  tale  of  a knight  and  a scornful  lady.  "To  a 

Lady  at  a Spring"  is  an  Italian  sonnet.  There  is  a suggestion  of 

Lowell' s *JLuf  Wiedersehen"  in  "The  Apple-trees  at  E ven"; 

"Yet  when  the  white-robed  priest  speaks  low 
And  bids  me  think  of  Heaven, 

I always  hear  the  breezes  blow 
The  apple-trees  at  even." 

"Love  Song"  is  full  of  the  music  of  the  Cavalier  poetry. 

"Love's  for  Youth,  and  not  for  Age, 

E'en  though  Age  should  wear  a crown; 

For  the  Poet,  not  the  Sage; 

Hot  the  Monarch,  but  the  Clown. 

Wert  thou  clad  in  triple  mail, 

In  a desert  far  apart. 

Hot  a whit  would  this  avail. 

Love  v/ould  find  and  pierce  thy  heart." 

The  general  impression  that  is  felt  after  reading  these  poems  is 

that  each  one  has  been  heard  somewhere  before.  There  is  nothing 

really  original  in  any  of  them,  but  they  are  none  the  less  of  Mr. 

Page's  composition.  He  has  reproduced  the  poetical  strains  of  the 

singers  of  the  past  in  something  the  same  way  an  organist  improvizes 

upon  another's  theme.  In  the  introduction  to  the  poems,  Mr.  Page  has 

placed  a sentence  which  justifies  his  poetry: 

"That  he  (the  minor 

poet)  has  heard,  however . brokenly,  at  however  vast  a distance, 
snatches  of  those  strains  which  thrilled  the  souls  of  Marlowe  and 
Milton  and  Seats  and  Shelley,  even  though  he  may  never  produce  one 

1.  Suggested  by  "An  Idealist  in  Prose  (A  Criticism  of  Mr.  Page)", 
Outlook,  87:  742-5,  H ov ember  30,  1907.  


. 


. 


. 


. 


* 


. 

, 


' 


' * ■ ! 


' 


. 

. 

, 

. 

71 


(1) 

of  them,  is  moreover  a sufficiently  high  reward.” 

The  appearance  of  "Under  the  Crust”  in  1907  was  the  occasion  for 

a critic  upon  the  staff  of  The  Outlook:  to  discuss  the  new  stories  and 

( 2 ) 

the  recent  poems  in  an  article  called  "An  Idealist  in  ProseV  Since 
this  criticism  is  a keen  analysis  of  Mr.  Page's  writings,  a summary 
of  it  will  not  he  out  of  place  here.  Mr.  Page  has,  the  paper  begins, 
the  American  temperament  and  the  American  point  of  view;  he  believes 
instinc tively  in  the  best  things;  he  has  the  courage  of  a great  hope, 
lie  is  the  recording  secretary  of  a peculiar  form  of  social  life  which 
had  the  charm  of  lavish  hospitality,  gracious  manners,  a generous 
habit  of  life,  and  a keen  sense  of  personal  dignity.  A reading  of 
"Marse  Chan"  and  "Meh  lady"  gives  a feeling  of  the  finality  which 
comes  from  those  things  which  are  so  adequately  done  that  the  imagi- 
nation rests  content  in  them.  They  are  the  finest  portraiture  known 
of  the  old-time  Virginia  gentlefolk  and  of  their  relations  with  their 
family  slaves.  The  charm  of  this  society  lay  in  the  absence  of  com- 
mercial spirit,  in  the  emphasis  of  the  arts  of  social  intercourse, 
and  in  a chivalrous  feeling  for  women.  Mr.  Page  has  realized  the 
latent  idealism  of  this  people,  and  has  been  one  of  the  chief  inter- 
preters of  the  Old  South. 

Uot  only  has  he  written  much  of  the  time  before  the  war,  but  he 
has  also  made  a carefully  considered  study  of  the  Rec on s true ti on 
period  in  "Red  Rock".  This  novel  is  fair  in  spirit,  although  some  of 
its  facts  might  have  a different  int erpretati on.  The  book  expresses 
his  indignation  against  the  injustice  of  the  times,  an  indignation 
which  is  a forcible  expression  of  his  idealism.  In  his  later  writ- 
ings he  has  attacked  the  pretension,  waste,  and  vulgarity  of  the  ul- 
tra-fashionable, and  the  extravagence,  disolay,  and  moral  laxity  of 

1.  "The  Coast  of  Bohemia",  Pastime  Stories.  X. 

2.  The  Outlook,  87:742-3,  November  3J,  1907.  _____ 


. 


. 

. 


. 


. 

. 


■ 


. 


. 


- 


, 


72 

the  idle  rich.  Always  has  he  represented  the  old,  but  ever  new, 
qualities  of  real  social  life  - cleanness,  refinement,  honor,  dignity, 
and  courage.  With  Howells,  James,  and  Wister  he  has  stood  for  the 
Americanism  which  is  not  vulgarized  by  wealth  nor  perverted  by 
leisure. 

In  "Under  the  Cru3t"  is  an  idealism  expressed  in  delicate  and 
sympathetic  studies  of  men  and  women  who  resist  commercialism  and  who 
live  as  if  life  were  a matter  of  the  spirit  and  not  of  physical  luxu- 
ry. "Miss  Godwin's  Inheritance"  tells  of  the  supremacy  of  sentiment 
in  a woman's  heart.  "A  Brother  to  Diogenes"  is  a story  of  a gold 
prospector  in  California,  an  idealist  seen  against  a vast  and  lonely 
background.  There  is  a beautiful  kind  of  altruism  in  "My  Friend  the 
Doctor",  where  the  great  specialist  devotes  so  much  loving  care  upon 
the  little  cripple  who  might  have  been  his  own  daughter.  "A  doth” 
is  a vigorous  presentation  of  an  elemental  man,  a self-made  American 
gambling  at  Monte-Carlo. 

It  is  easy  to  pass  from  the  short-stories  of  1907  to  the  biog- 
raphy of  "Robert  E.  lee.  Southerner",  of  1908,  because  this  history 
is  only  another  expression  of  Mr.  Page's  idealism.  General  Dee  is, 
in  Mr.  Page's  memory,  the  nearest  human  approach  to  the  ideal  man. 

The  author  could  find  very  little  wrong  in  the  soldier  with  which  to 
find  fault,  and  very  much  to  praise.  The  general  was  the  personifi- 
cation of  all  the  strong  qualities  of  the  Southern  people;  he  was  the 
guiding  force  that  made  the  Confederacy  continuous,  once  the  decision 
to  secede  had  been  made  and  the  new  government  established. 

There  was  more  idealism  yet  from  the  pen  of  Mr.  Page  in  1908, 
for,  in  that  year,  "Tommy  Trot's  Visit  to  Santa  Claus"  was  published. 
It  is  a story  for  children,  with  a very  evident  moral,  intended  to 


1 


, 

. 


> ' 


’ 


73 


guide  little  boys  and  girls  along  the  way  towards  ideal  actions. 

In  1912,  ’’Robert  E.  lee,  Man  and  Soldier”  appeared,  an  enlarge- 
ment of  the  urevious  biography.  It  is  a somewhat  exhaustive  treat- 
ment of  General  Lee’s  ancestry,  of  his  life  and  service  before  1861, 
and  of  his  prominent  part  in  the  Civil  War.  The  expository  chapters 
that  precede  the  detailed  accounts  of  the  battles  are  by  far  the  most 
interesting  parts  of  the  book.  Mr.  Page  has  not  been  able  to  vary 
his  discussion  of  the  engagements  sufficiently  to  prevent  an  unpleas- 
ant monotony  of  treatment.  For  reference  purposes  the  precise  ac- 
counts of  the  battles  of  the  Army  of  Virginia  are  valuable,  but  they 
prevent  the  whole  biography  from  being  of  the  highest  literary  value. 

There  is  something  suggestive  of  the  peacefulness  of  a benedic- 
tion in  the  title  of  the  volume  which  followed,  in  1913,  the  revised 
biography  of  General  Lee.  No  name  could  more  fittingly  designate  the 

last  short-stories  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page  than  "The  Land  of  the  Spir- 

(1) 

it",  the  land  of  the  Supreme  Ideal.  "The  Stranger's  Pew"  is  written 
in  the  satiric  manner  that  Mr.  Pase  used  so  many  years  before  in  "My 
Cousin  Fanny"  and  in  "Run  to  Seed".  It  is  an  allegory  dealing  with 
the  tendency  of  some  fashionable  churches  to  exclude  Christianity. 
"The  Old  Planter's"  is  a story  of  a decaying  remnant  of  the  old 
Southern  hosoitality.  "The  Bigot"  describes  a New  Ehgland  religious 
fanatic,  and  "The  Trick-Doctor"  portrays  the  character  of  a wily  ne- 
gro grafter.  "The  Outcast"  follows  the  theme  of  "Madam  X",  but  the 
play,  the  oreface  states,  appeared  after  the  story  was  written. 

The  real  gems  of  this  collection  are  two  stories  of  Christmas. 
One  is  "The  Stable  of  the  Inn",  and  the  other  "The  Shepherd  Who 
Watched  by  Night".  The  latter  is  the  story  of  an  old  clergyman,  liv- 
ing past  his  time  of  active  service.  His  house  is  cold,  he  has  lit- 
1.  The  Land  of  the  Spirit,  (Charles  Scribner's  Sons.  New  York.  1913). 


. 


- 

. 


■ 

, 


. 


. 


. 


, 


- 

, 


74 


tie  food,  he  faces  dismissal  by  his  congregation,  who  are  eager  for 
a younger  minister.  He  forgets,  however,  his  own  sufferings  when  a 
fallen  woman,  who  has  once  sneered  at  him,  sends  for  him  to  attend 
her  dying  hours.  When  he  reaches  his  home  again  through  the  midnight 
winter  storm,  he  finds  in  his  barn  a young  mother  and  her  baby.  He 
takes  them  into  his  house,  and  cares  for  them  at  the  expense  of  his 
o wn  comfort.  The  next  morning  the  Christmas  service  has  a new  mean- 
ing for  him,  and,  through  him,  for  his  people.  But  it  is  his  last 
service,  for,  as  he  repeats  the  words  of  the  herald  angel,  he  sinks 
to  the  floor,  his  work  over.  "The  Stable  of  the  Inn”  is  a re-telling 
in  modern  phraseology,  of  the  Gospel  story  of  the  infancy  of  the 
Christ.  There  is  a development  of  the  characters  of  Mary  and  of  Jo- 
seph, wholly  consistent  with  the  different  sacred  accounts,  that 
makes  this  story  a valuable  contribution  to  that  group  of  literature 
to  which  the  shepherd  scene  in  "Ben  Hur"  and  to  which  "The  Other  Wise 
Man"  belong.  The  passage  concerning  the  reception  of  the  travelers 
at  the  inn  illustrates  ably  how  Mr.  Page  has  put  together  his  story, 
gathering  a phrase  from  one  Bible  story  and  a word  from  another,  sup- 
plementing them  with  passages  in  modern  diction. 

".  • . Joseph  made  known  his  situation.  His  wife  could  go  no 
farther  and  could  not  remain  in  the  street  all  night.  This  did  not 
avail.  The  porter  spoke  with  contempt.  'Better  than  you  have  been 
turned  away  tonight. 1 

"'Than  me  - Yes,1  said  Joseph;  'but  not  better  than  that  I 
bring.'  He  took  from  his  scrip  an  official  paper  and  added  that  he 
had  come  'under  Caesar's  order.' 

'"You  trouble  me  much,'  growled  the  porter.  But  he  admitted 
them,  and  told  Joseph  that  he  might  spend  the  night  in  the  stable,  if 
he  could  find  a place  there. 

"'In  the  stable!'  said  Joseph. 

"'Yes,  and  you'd  better  be  glad  to  get  that,'  growl ed  the  porter, 
'The  other  night  we  had  to  put  up  a man  that  a dog  of  a Samaritan  had 


. 

. 


- 


75 

found  on  the  road  from  Jericho,  naked  and  half  dead.  He  must  needs 
bring  him  here  and  ordered  the  best  room  for  him.  A priest  and  a 
Levite  were  here  that  night,  and  a pretty  fuss  they  made  too  - they 
wanted  him  put  in  the  stable;  but  the  Samaritan's  money  was  good,  so 
the  master  took  him  in.'" 

A passage  from  the  preface  to  "The  Land  of  the  Spirit"  reveals 
the  feeling  that  binds  the  various  stories  together.  More  than  this, 
it  shows  how  Mr.  Page  is  still  keeping  abreast  of  his  time,  and  is 
still  trying  to  express  in  his  writings  the  current  of  the  thought 
and  of  the  ideals  of  his  country. 

"Possibly  the  most  notable  change  in 
our  national  life  in  the  last  decades  is  the  deepening  of  its  note. 
Whereas  formerly  attention  was  given  largely  to  things  of  the  sur- 
face, of  late  the  mind  has  been  directed  to  those  things  which  lie 
beneath.  A whole  realm  has  been  opened  up  for  consideration  and  for 
work.  Duty  to  God  and  duty  to  our  neighbor  have  come  almost  suddenly 
to  assume  a new  and  personal  meaning,  springing  unexpectedly  into  a 
new  relation  to  our  life.  And  we  find  the  universal  mind  turning 
into  serious  heart-searching  to  a frank  facing  of  the  divine  command- 
ments. Out  of  this  fresh  moral  consciousness  have  grown  most  of  the 
new  moral  movements  in  our  days,  and  much  the  larger  part  of  the 
spiritual  forces  that  have  had  their  birth  in  our  time.  Prom  taking 
thought  only  of  the  things  of  the  body  we  have  come  to  ponder  the 
treasures  of  the  soul,  and  the  new  light  has  shown  us  that  the  field 
is  no  longer  confined  to  a future /state  in  some  distant  heaven,  but 
lies  here  actually  in  our  midst." 

Surely  do  such  thoughts  as  these  reveal  the  reason  why  the  president 
who  was  himself  later  to  write  "Make  the  world  safe  for  Democracy" 
chose  Thomas  Del  son  Page  to  represent  the  United  States  at  a foreign 
court I 


With  the  publication  of  "The  land  of  the  Spirit"  there  closed, 
practically,  the  active  literary  life  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page,  but  his 


1.  "The  Stable  of  the  Inn",  The  Land  of  the  Spirit , 95-6. 

2.  Ibid. , v-vi . 


76 


life  of  faithful  service  to  his  fellow-men  has  continued  every  mo- 
ment since.  Long  after  he  has  gone  to  his  Ideal  Country,  there  will 
remain  his  written  words  to  amuse,  to  instruct,  to  strengthen,  and  to 
guide  those  who  follow  him.  Mr.  Page's  life  has  been  quiet.  His 
stories  and  essays  are  unpretentious  in  form.  But  there  has  been, 
and  still  is,  a force  behind  the  unobtrusiveness  that  is  all  the  more 
effective  for  its  tranquillity. 

Although  Mr.  Page  will  always  be  identified  with  the  early 
growth  of  the  American  short-story,  he  has  claims,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, to  some  little  distinction  in  other  departments  of  the  litera- 
ry art.  His  novels,  while  by  no  means  perfect,  have  given  pleasure 
to  a large  part  of  the  reading-public.  "Red  Rock",  especially,  has 
no  doubt  influenced  the  later  novels  on  Southern  subjects  from  the 
pens  of  such  men  as  Thomas  Rixon,  Jr.,  and  Randall  Parrish.  Mr.  Page 
has  written  poetry,  and  he  has  been  a biographer,  while,  as  an  essay- 
ist he  has  nearly  equalled  his  own  achievement  as  a short-story  writ- 
er. In  fact,  it  may  quite  safely  be  said  that  his  historical  essays 
are  potentially  more  valuable  than  the  rest  of  his  literary  work,  be- 
cause of  the  assistance  they  may  be  to  the  future  author  of  the  real 
history  of  the  South. 

As  to  the  period  of  time  delineated  in  Mr.  Page's  writings, 
there  is  to  be  found,  somewhere  or  other,  a portrayal  of  every  epoch 
of  American  history  from  the  earliest  explorations  upon  the  Horth 
American  continent  to  the  present  day.  The  essays  dealing  with  the 
early  history  of  the  Colony  of  Virginia  contain  grauhic  accounts  of 
the  days  when  the  Hutch,  the  Spanish,  the  French,  and  the  Jfhglish 
were  each  seeding  to  establish  a foothold  on  the  Atlantic  Coast. 

Other  essays  trace  the  change  in  Virginia's  government  in  the  seven- 


77 

teenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  until,  at  the  Revolution,  she  became 
a part  of  the  United  States.  The  earlier  short-stories  are  pictures 
of  the  antebellum  and  of  the  war  years  of  the  last  century,  while  the 
later  tales  and  novels  continue  the  sequence  through  Reconstruction 
and  through  the  opening  up  of  the  Middle  ’.Vest,  until  the  early  years 
of  the  twentieth  century,  when  the  United  States  had  become  a tre- 
mendous force  in  the  world. 

To  accomplish  this  long  task,  which  engaged  him  for  three  decades 
and  more,  it  has  been  necessary  for  Mr.  Page  to  gather  together  a 
vast  amount  of  many  kinds  of  material.  Some  of  this  material  was  his 
own  experience,  some  was  the  experience  of  others  told  to  him,  some 
was  found  in  books  and  public  documents  which  he  read  with  selective 
care.  In  hi 3 mind  it  was  all  mixed  and  fused  together,  superfluities 
were  removed  or  adornment  was  given  to  bare  and  unattractive  places, 
and  then  it  came  forth  in  several  literary  forms  to  entertain  and  to 
instruct  his  readers.  In  a sense,  Mr.  Page  has  pre-dig es ted  the  in- 
formation at  his  disposal,  honing  to  make  it  easier  for  others  to  ob- 
tain the  knowledge  he  wished  to  impart  to  them.  He  has  acted  as  an 
interpreter  not  only  of  his  own  time  and  of  his  own  native  state,  but 
alsoof  past  generations  and  of  the  whole  United  States. 

As  a poet,  Mr.  Page  shows  the  influence  of  the  romanticism  of 
Medieval  and  of  Cavalier  literature,  of  which  the  Southerners  were  so 
fond,  the  literature  in  which  Sidney  Lanier  found  so  much  inspiration, 
His  dialect  poems  are  but  a phase  of  the  movement  responsible  for  the 
Pike  County  ballads  and  Riley's  Hoosier  verso.  It  is  difficult  to 

discover  anyone  with  whom  to  compare  Mr.  Page  as  an  essayist,  because 
historical  matter  is  not  a common  subject  for  such  expository  writing 
In  "My  Cousin  Fanny"  and  "The  Long  Hil] sid eM there  is  the  personal  ele 


, 


. 


r 


. 


. 

. 

. 


. 

- 

. 

. 


. 


' 

, 


78 


ment  that  is  so  often  found  nowadays  upon  the  pages  of  The  Atlantic 
Monthly.  Of  course,  there  are  many  references  to  his  family  and  to 
his  ancestry  in  some  of  the  essays  on  the  South,  but  the  general  dis- 
cussion is  of  topics  outside  of  the  usual  type  of  personal  essay.  The 
tone,  however,  is  intimate  and  conversational;  so,  after  all,  Mr. 

Page  must  be  considered  a member  of  the  large  group  who  have  followed 
the  lead  of  Charles  Lamb  and  Le  Quine ey.  As  a biographer,  he  has 
scarcely  done  enough  work  to  establish  for  himself  a definite  place 
in  American  literature;  hence,  his  study  of  General  Lee  may  be 
thought  of  as  a prolonged  essay,  rather  than  as  a distinct  form  of 
literary  effort.  It  is  difficult  to  say  just  the  correct  thing  about 
Mr.  Page  as  a novelist,  because  "Red  Rock"  and  its  two  comnanions  are 
not  mechanically  perfect,  and  yet  they  are  so  interesting  and  so  ap- 
pealing that  there  must  be  some  great  value  in  them.  Only  a critic 
would  pretend  to  find  fault  with  them,  because  they  do  not  follow 
all  the  rules,  and  even  he  could  not  fail  to  feel  the  charm  of  their 
simple,  flowing  style  and  the  delightful  quality  of  their  narrative. 
Mr.  Page  i3  not  a great  novelist,  but  he  is  a very  good  one.  But 
there  is  no  doubt  of  Mr.  Page's  rank  as  a short-story  writer.  There 
he  is  a master,  a creator.  He  is  the  author  who  showed  that  dialect 
could  be  used  in  telling  a short  narrative,  without  impairing  in  the 
least  its  effectiveness.  It  cannot  be  repeated  too  emphatically: 
Thomas  Nelson  Page  helped  in  the  development  of  the  short-story  in 
America  by  clothing  his  tales  in  the  dialect  of  the  Virginian  negro. 

Mr.  Page  is,  like  so  many  other  orominent  authors,  difficult  to 
classify  exactly.  In  his  loving  reminiscences  of  the  vanished 
Southern  aristocracy  and  in  his  hopeful  visions  of  the  future  of 
America,  he  is  an  idealist.  Or,  if  the  term  suggests  more,  if  the 


. 


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■ 


V 


. . , 


79 

influence  of  Dickens  is  keenly  sensed,  he  may  be  styled  a sentimental- 
ist, for  there  is  much  in  Mr.  Page's  stories  of  the  early  nineteenth- 
century  delight  in  love  and  lovers,  pathos  and  tears.  Mr.  Page  may 
be  called  a romanticist,  with  the  thought  in  mind  of  his  intense  re- 
gard for  the  sweep  and  movement  of  action  that  his  reading  of  ocott 
taught  him.  But  these  three  terms  are  merely  variants  of  the  same 
idea,  and  they  assist  materially  in  denominating  Mr.  Page's  literary 
religion,  but  they  do  not  include  the  realism  of  the  dialect  stories. 
Had  it  not  been  for  the  peculiar  form  of  "Marse  Chan”,  it  is  very 
doubtful  that  Mr.  Page  w ould  have  enjoyed  the  literary  success  that 
has  been  his.  The  very  fact  that  he  could  transfer  the  negro  with 
his  character  and  his  speech  to  paper  was  the  foundation  of  Mr.  Page's 
fame.  It  is  true  that  the  bulk  of  Mr.  Page's  work  is  idealistic  and 
sentimental,  but  it  is  likewise  true  that  this  great  share  is  infe- 
rior to  the  small  portion  that  is  realistic.  If  some  strange  acci- 
dent should  remove  from  human  knowledge  "Red  Rock",  "Gordon  Keith", 
"The  Burial  of  the  Guns",  and  the  other  stories  in  the  romantic  vein, 
but  should  allow  "In  Ole  Virginia"  to  remain,  the  world  would  still 
be  rich.  In  these  six  stories,  not  the  sentimentalism,  but  the  real- 
ism is  the  great  gift  to  American  literature  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page. 


. 


, 


80 


VIII.  BIBLIOGRAPHY. 

Volume  The  "Plantation  .Edition”  (Charles  Scribner’s  Sons, 

N ew  York) . 

I.  In  Ole  Virginia  - 1887  (1908) ( l) 

Marse  Chan,  A Tale  of  Old  Virginia 

”Unc ! Edinburg's  Drowndin*",  A Plantation  Echo 

Meh  Lady:  A Story  of  the  War 

Ole  'Stracted 

"No  Haid  Pawn" 

Polly:  A Christmas  Recollection 

II.  The  Buri al  of  the  Guns  - 1892  (1908) 

The  Burial  of  the  Guns 
Little  Darby  / 

"Run  to  Seed"  ^ 

My  Cousin  Fanny 

The  Gray  Jacket  of  "No.  4"  , » 

"George  Washing  ton)  slT  Last  Puel'^' 

P ' laski ' s Tunam  ent 

Miss  Dangerlie's  Roses 

Eow  the  Captain  Made  Christmas 

III.  On  Newfound  River  - 1891  (1908) 

IV, -V.  Red  Rock  - A Chronicle  of  Reconstruction  - 1898  (1908) 

VI. -VII.  Gordon  Xeith  - 1903  (1908) 

VIII.  The  Old  G entl ernan  of  the  Black  Stock  - (1908) 

The  Old  Gentleman  of  the  Black  Stock  - 1897 
Santa  Claus's  Partner  - 1899 

IX.  Bred  in  the  Bone  - (1908) 

Bred  in  the  Bone  - Century,  October,  1901 
The  Spectre  in  the  Cart 

The  Sheriff's  Bluff  - Scribner 1 s , April,  1902 
The  Hong  Hillside 

Old  Jabe's  Marital  Experiments  - Century , September,  1902 
The  Christmas  Peace 
Mam'  Lyddy's  Recognition 
ELsket'2'  . 

A Soldier  of  the  Enpire'  2' 


1.  The  date  in  parenthesis  shows  time  the  volume  was  published} 
other  dates  indicate  time  of  first  publication  or  of  copyright. 

2.  Originally  published  in  Elsket  and  Other  Stori es , 1891. 


81 

X.  Pastime  Stories  - (1908) 

Pastime  Stories  - 1894 
P o ems : 

The  Coast  of  3ohe:aia,  etc.  - 1905 
Dialect  Poems  from  3ef o 1 de  7/ar  - 1888 


XI.  Two  Littl e Conf ederates  - (1908) 

Two  Little  Confederates  - 1888 
Among  the  Camps  - 1891 
A Captured  Santa  Claus 

Kittykin,  and  the  Part  She  Played  in  the  War 
’’Nancy  Pansy" 

"Jack  and  Jake" 

Two  Prisoners  - 1898 

XII.  The  Old  South  - (1908) 

The  Old  South  - 1892 

Authorship  in  the  South  Before  the  War 
Glimpses  of  Life  in  Colonial  Virginia 
Social  Life  in  Old  Virginia  Before  the  War 
Two  Old  Colonial  Places 
The  Old  Virginia  Lawyer 

The  Old-Time  Negro  - Scribner*  s . November,  1904 
The  7/ant  of  a History  of  the  Southern  People 

XIII.  The  Old  Dominion  - Her  Making  and  Her  Manners  - 1908  (1909) 
The  Beginning  of  America 

Jamestown,  the  Birthplace  of  the  American  People 

Colonial  Life 

The  Revolutionary  Movement 

Thomas  Jefferson  and  the  University  of  Virginia 
The  Southern  People  During  Reconstruction 
The  Old  Dominion  Since  the  War 
The  Old  Neighborhood  in  Virginia 

An  Old  Virginia  Sunday  - Scribner1 s , December,  1901 

XIV.  Under  the  Crust  - (1909) 

Under  the  Crust:  - 1907 

Miss  Godwin's  Inheritance  - Scribner' s . August,  1904 
The  New  Agent  - Ladies'  Home~ J ournal . Anri  1 . 1905 
A Brother  to  Diogenes  - Scribner's,  March,  1906 
A Goth  - Seri bner ' s . February,  19  07 
Leander's  Light,  Century,  July,  1907 
My  Friend  the  Doctor,  Scribner1 s . November,  1907 
The  Hostage 

Tommy  Trot's  Visit  to  Santa  Claus  - 1908 
XV. -XVI.  John  Marvel,  Assistant  - 1909  (1910) 

XVII. -XVIII.  Robert  E.  Lee  - Man  and  Soldier  - 1911  (1912) 


82 


Th e Land  of  the  Spirit  - (Charles  Scribner’s  Sons,  New  York,  1913). 
The  w01d  Planters' ,f  - C entury.  May,  1909 
The  3igot  - Sc ri bn er ’ s . K ov  emb  er , 1910 

The  Shepherd  Who  hatched  by  Night  - Scribner’ s . March,  1913. 

The  Stable  of  the  Inn,  Scribner*  s . December,  1912. 

The  Stranger’s  Pew  - Scribner’s,  December,  1910 
The  Trick-Doctor  - Scribner’s,  September,  1911 
The  Outcast 


Miscellaneous  Articles  by  Thomas  Nelson  Page 
not  included  in  his  collected  works 

The  Lynching  of  Negroes  - N orth  American , January,  1904 

The  Negro:  the  Southern’s  Problem  - McClure*  s , March,  1904 

The  Disfranchisement  of  the  Negro  - Scribner 1 s . July,  1904 

The  Southern  People  during  Reconstruction  - Atlantic , Sent  amber,  1901 

The  University  of  Virginia  - Scribner*  s . April,  1905 

The  Great  American  Question  - McClure 'Ig , March,  1907 

Jamestown,  C entury.  May,  1907 

Jamestown  Settlement  and  Its  Fruit,  Civil  Liberty,  Outlook.  May,  1907 
The  Decay  of  Manners  - Century,  April,  1911 
(The  Democratic  Opportunity  - North  American,  February,  1911 
General  Lee  and  the  Confederate  Government  - Scribner’ s.  November, 

1911 

The  South  - C ount ry  Life.  April,  1912 

The  Virginians  and  Constitutional  Government  - North  American,  March. 

1913 

Thomas’s  Baptism  - Scribner’ s . August,  1913 

The  Romantic  Founding  of  Washington  - Scribner's,  September,  1913 
The  Earthquake  in  the  Abruzzi  - Scribner' s.  April,  1915 
Francis  Hopkins  on  Smith  - Scribner's.  September.  1915 
John  Fox  - Scribner’ s.  December,  1919 


Reviews  of  works  of  Thomas  Nelson  Page, 
portraits,  and  criticisms 

Gordon  Keith,  Reviews:  World ' s Work,  July,  1903 

Bookman.  July,  1903 
Dial . August  1,  1903 
Nati on , August  6,  1903 
Ind ependent , August  20,  1903 
Athenaeum , August  29,  1903 
In  Ole  Virginia,  Review:  Athenaeum.  January  4,  1902 
Page’s  Reply  to  Schurz  - Curran  t~Titerature.  May,  1904 
Portrait.  World ' 3 W o rk , July,  1903 
Portrait.  Outlook.  November  27,  1909. 

An  Idealist  in  Prose,  - Outlook.  November  30,  1907. 

In  Washington,  D.  C.  , F.  W.  Halsey,  American  Authors , 173-86 
The  Interpreter  of  the  South,  E.  Mims  - Atlantic , July,  1907. 

The  Literary  Career  of  Page,  E.  F.  Harkins  - Famous  Authors , 1902. 
Portrait  - R ev i ew  of  Revi ews , January,  1905;  B o okman . N ov  emb  er , 

1907;  Outlook.  November  27,  1909. 

The  Waning  Influence  of  T.  N.  Page  - Current  Literature,  August,  1907 


83 


Marse  Tom  at  Co'te;  poem.  R.  3ridges,  - Bookman , August,  1913 
More  Lines  to  T.  N.  P.;  poem.  J.  K.  Bangs  - Bookman,  October,  1913 
Pane  and  Life  in  Virginia,  H.  A.  Toulmin,  Jr.  - Social  Historians. 
Page's  Protest  against  the  Proposed  Change  of  Name  of  the  Protestant 

Episcopal  Church  - Ind ependent . April  24,  1913. 
Personal  Portraits,  H.  Thomason  - Bookman.  Seotember,  1913 
Portraits:  World  Today.  February,  1910 

Indeo end ent , November  17,  1910 
Chautauquan.  October,  1911 
Literary  Ligest.  May  24  and  July  5,  1913 
Review  of  F.evi  ews , August,  1913 


Collateral  Readings 

Pattee.  Fred  Lewis:  American  Literature  since  1870,  (Century  Company. 

New  York,  1915). 

Albright,  Evelyn  May;  The  Short-Story. 

£hc.yclopaeaia  Britannica  (11th  Edition). 

Notest ein-Lunn;  The  Mod ern  Short-Story . (A.  S.  Barnes  Company,  1914). 


